National Socialism for America
Blut, Ehre, und Loyalität
Multiple experts told a Senate panel this week that there is no data to support increasing the number of H-2B visas issued each year even though several Members of Congress are aggressively pushing for an increase in FY17 spending bills.
Last December, Congress approved a temporary increase to H-2Bs in the Omnibus spending bill. The provision exempted foreign workers who had held an H-2B visa in any of the previous three years from the annual cap of 66,000. The provision expires at the end of September unless renewed by Congress. But dozens of Members of Congress, from both political parties, and in both chambers of Congress, are pushing for the increase in the FY17 spending bills. During Wednesday's hearing before the Senate Subcommittee for Immigration and the National Interest, chaired by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Daniel Costa from the Economic Policy Institute said that labor shortages can be identified by increased wages, fast employment growth, and declining employment rates, but none of those factors exist in the current labor market. "No credible independent data or labor market metrics have been presented to prove the existence of labor shortages in H-2B occupations. In fact, the available evidence suggests the opposite. Wages in the top H-2B occupations have been flat or declining for over a decade, while unemployment rates in those occupations have been sky high, many at or hovering around double digits. Those are not the indicators of national-level labor shortages."Costa's conclusions were supported by Dr. Steve Camarota from the Center for Immigration Studies. Camarota also added that American workers fill the majority of jobs that are widely used by employers that use the H-2B program, proving that Americans are willing to work the jobs employers say the won't. "Based on the Census Bureau's American Community Survey (ACS), there are more than 975,000 native-born Americans who are landscapers and grounds keepers, and they comprise two-thirds of workers in that occupation. Fifty-one percent of maids are native-born and there are 880,000 of them. Two-thirds of construction laborers are native-born and there are 1.3 million of them. Seventy percent of cooks are U.S.-born and there are 1.8 million of them. The list can go on and on." |
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