Public Policy Research



Immigration and its Social and Economic Impact with Respect to Class and Poverty

Written By: Lee H. Walker
Published In: News & Views
Publication Date: December 1, 2006
Publisher: The New Coalition for Economic and Social Change

It appears immigration has become the new "third rail" of politics. It has become even hotter than the traditional hot-button topics of abortion and affirmative action. In fact, the Wall Street Journal, in a recent editorial, said the most critical mail it receives from readers, by far, concerns the issue of immigration.

In the past, blacks marched, then voted, and the results were the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Recently, I have been hearing from Hispanic groups the slogan, "Today we march, tomorrow we vote."


Rising Immigration

As John Adams said, "facts are stubborn things." Immigration reform legislation adopted in 1986 combined amnesty for three million illegal immigrants with a promise of tougher enforcement, particularly in the workplace. The amnesty was delivered, but the promise of tougher enforcement of immigration laws never was. Corporate America found a need for more low-cost labor to meet the demands of global competition and a growing economy, and tougher rules never materialized or just slid off the plate politically.

In 2006, according to credible figures, there are 12 million illegal immigrants currently living in the United States. But some folks say there might be as many as 30 million illegal immigrants in the U.S., with 4 to 5 million more entering the country each year. Again, some folks are saying that by 2025, 100 million illegal immigrants could be living in the U.S.

My concern is not that a nation of 300 million people could not absorb 100 million people in twenty years. With the recent increase of global terrorism, my concern is that many of those folks could be criminals and/or terrorists. Our borders both north and south must be protected.


The Economics of Immigration

Another large concern is that according to some, "most of these illegals are poor, uneducated, and speak only Spanish." Be that as it may, if 12 million illegal immigrants were to leave the country, the results would be economically disastrous, at least according to the U.S. Immigration Office in New York in its September 2006 newsletter.

It pointed out that currently unemployed and low-income workers would benefit some because there would be more jobs, but labor costs would increase, which would be passed on to the consumer and have a negative effect on the economy. The U.S. government would also lose out on money that illegal immigrants contribute to Medicare and Social Security that they are unable to collect due to their legal status.

Immigration is a "black issue" because of the economics of labor. Labor is not exempt from the laws of supply and demand. Immigration increases the supply of labor, but generally not the number of jobs. When immigration has increased in the past, it was clearly not in the best interest of most black Americans and other non-whites, who found themselves competing with low-cost immigrant labor for entry-level and other low-wage and less-desirable jobs.


Historical Perspective

There is a lot of heated rhetoric going around, but to get a better understanding of what immigration brings to the table of American citizens and its socio-economic impact, one should look at the history of black Americans and immigration. I will be advancing some of the ideas of Dr. Frank L. Morris, former dean of graduate studies at Morgan State University, in a study he made a decade ago that I have updated. He really made a deep study of the issue of immigration.

One of the basic facts of American history that is not widely discussed is the nation's long-standing preference for immigrant labor, as opposed to trained and employable native-born black Americans. The Chinese, for example, were kept out of the country by law until the high demand for low-cost labor to build the railroads on the West Coast overcame racist objections.

Immigrant labor, beginning with those coming from European countries, but extending even to the Chinese, was preferred over blacks who were already here. Most of the immigrants spoke no English, but came from the European countries that white America immigrated from. Blacks were the residual labor pool, never able to enjoy the benefits of full employment except in times of war when the white immigrant labor supply was not available.

Booker T. Washington, in his famous 1895 Atlanta Exposition speech, pleaded with corporate America and politicians to use the black and white labor supply of the South to work in their new factories rather than use all European immigrants. Few listened.

There were efforts made by the government to send black Americans out of the country after the Civil War, just as some propose to send Latinos "back home" today. It did not work with blacks.

Thus the experience of blacks in America can be recalled in order to contribute some valid history to the immigration debate today. The present debate includes many of the same elements of discrimination and racism that blacks experienced from the time of the Emancipation Proclamation, through the era of the Civil Rights Movement, and still in the current affirmative action era.

The point I am making here is that immigration has always uncovered some form of discrimination and/or racism, and this present debate is no exception. As a philosopher once said, "those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."


The Right Response to Immigration

Now, interestingly enough, we are beginning to hear comments like "blacks and whites will have to band together to protect our country from the immigrants." Unfortunately, I have to admit some blacks are buying into this.

The solution is not turning back immigrants. It is equipping native blacks with the skills and attitudes to compete with immigrants. At the turn of the twentieth century, Booker T. Washington was the largest black employer of educated blacks in the country. He realized that he had to find a solution to the problem of unskilled blacks falling behind due to immigration. In a 1912 speech before the National Negro Business League here in Chicago he said the following:

"Now is the time--not in some far off future, but now is the time--for us as a race to prove to the world that in a state of freedom, we have the ability and inclination to do our part in owning, developing, manufacturing, and trading in the natural resources of our country. If the Italians and the Greeks can come to this country, strangers to our language and civilization, and within a few years gain wealth and independence by trading in fruits, the Negro can do the same thing."

Unfortunately, Washington died three years later and the black leadership turned its focus from economics to politics and racial integration, important issues to be sure, but as Booker T. Washington once again said, "at the bottom of education, at the bottom of politics, at the bottom of religion itself there must be for our race, as for all races ... economic independence."

Entrepreneurship is certainly not foreign to the black community. Earl Graves, founder and publisher of Black Enterprise magazine, has been a friend of mine for about 40 years, a friendship formed during my New York City days at the Brooklyn NAACP. He was in town this past weekend being interviewed and filmed as a HistoryMaker. He is a graduate of Morgan State and has donated more than a million dollars to the school. He's living proof that blacks can succeed in business.


Missed Opportunity

If black leadership had followed Washington's guidance, the leadership would have to have asked two questions: "How did the European immigrants escape the ghettos so soon after they arrived?" and "What is the chief cause of blacks' economic inequality?"

One response appears in J. Owens Smith's book, The Politics of Racial Inequality. He writes:

"[P]ublic policies that grant or deny groups the liberty to take advantage of a wide range of economic opportunities that exist within society's income redistribution system become the primary reasons why more blacks and Hispanics have not been able to escape the slums in large numbers. The federal government has historically refused to offer them the same system of protection to acquire property and to pursue a wide range of economic opportunities, as it did for European immigrants."

I understand this, and I believe Washington understood that point very well, but if Washington's advice had been taken, the next twenty years would have found the number of blacks with low skills on the decline in spite of intimidation. If you make a product that other people want and value, Washington said again and again, they will have no choice but to buy it from you, to hire you, to begin treating you as their equal.

But his advice was not followed. Instead, the leadership of both blacks and whites advanced a long list of reasons why gaps between blacks and whites still exist, including: rejection of the Protestant work ethic, weak family structure, inability to delay instant gratification, a deficiency in IQ and culture, and of course discrimination.

While many of these are important factors, talking about them hasn't made native blacks more competitive with immigrants. If it did, we wouldn't be addressing the impact of immigration on blacks here today. Its impact on us would be no different than it is on any other ethnic and social group.


What Needs to be Done

The much bigger and deeper reasons why immigration hurts blacks is because welfare policies, combined with a legacy of slavery and institutionalized discrimination, drove men out of the home and weakened the family structure, and labor unions kept blacks from moving up within the trades.

The unintended consequence of welfare was to create a people dependent on the charity of others, deprived of role models, and with few assets. When such people find and hold onto jobs, they tend to be low-paying and insecure. Of course they are vulnerable to competition from immigrants. They are trying to live their lives working jobs that are meant only to be steps at the bottom of career ladders.

We should stop and ask ourselves what role the labor movement has had in the recent rush to outsource manufacturing or to employ undocumented workers. Has organized labor helped or hurt the prospects of the less skilled, less educated, and those subject to discrimination because of where they live or the color of their skin?

President Bush signed an immigration reform bill last week, "The Secure Fence Act of 2006." The bill is silent about what blacks can do to better compete with new immigrants coming here to seek a better life. Unless we address this side of the issue, though, no law passed in Washington will be complete and no real solution will be possible.

Let me say in conclusion that we are still the United States of America, a country that boldly welcomes refugees from other countries, that promises that hard work is rewarded, and safety and prosperity can be earned here. We must, as a nation, remain open to legal immigration, without discrimination, while protecting ourselves from criminals and terrorists. But at the same time, we must help our vulnerable populations achieve the American Dream too, giving them the skills they need to compete with immigrants for good jobs.

Thank you.

Lee H. Walker (lwalker@newcoalition.org) is president of The New Coalition for Economic and Social Change and a senior fellow of The Heartland Institute. These remarks were delivered on October 31 at a workshop addressing Immigration and its Social-Economic Impact, part of the 60th annual luncheon sponsored by the City of Chicago Commission on Human Relations.

For more information ...

Books

Butler, John S. and George Kozmetsky. Immigrant and Minority Entrepreneurship. Prager Press. 2005

Corsi, Jerome and Jim Gilchrist. Minutemen-The Battle to Secure America's Borders. World Ahead Publishing. 2006

Portes, Alejandro and Ruben G. Rumbaut. Immigrant America. Third Edition, UCLA Press. 2006

Smith, J. Owens. The Politics of Racial Inequality. The Chief Cause of Blacks' Economic Inequality-How Did the European Immigrants Escape the Slums? Greenwood Press, NY. 1987


Articles and Reports

Center of Immigration Studies. "Cast Down Your Bucket Where You Are – Black Americans on Immigration." Washington, D.C. 1996

United States Immigration Newsletter. "Consequences of moving millions of immigrants from the US." New York. 2006

Wall Street Journal. "Immigration Reform." 2006

Chicago Chronicle. Law School Conference – Immigration Law and Policy, University of Chicago. 2006.

Pew Hispanic Center. A Statistical Portrait of Hispanics at Mid-Decade. Washington, D.C. 2006