"Xenophobia is good for the workers"?

[inthebrain]

I heard this a few times the past week. I don't know where this talking point came from. Personally I don't buy it and think it a load of bullshit.

Borders themselves are a very capitalistic thing. In this country dates back to manifest destiny and in Africa and the ME, colonialism. It ain't working folk that drew them on the map but the capitalists cause it serves their interests not ours. Of course they have to convince the working classes they exist for either their personal or economic protection in order to enforce them.

They never really provide proof of their claims though. More often they exist to exploit people on either side of them. Much like the so called "carpetbaggers" and the capitalists use state boundaries to exploit the workers.

I don't by it though and don't know who's selling this crap lately.

[lumberjack_jeff]

1. Explain in more detail how borders... barriers to labor migration...

... serve the interests of the capitalists within the higher-wage country.

They don't. It's the capitalists who love NAFTA. It's the capitalists who love the NAFTA super highway. It's capitalists who love unlimited cheap labor, and to force US labor into competition with third world countries.

I don't know where you got your "quote" and I wouldn't put it that way, but labor should look out for the interests of labor. Our interest is in keeping our wages as high as possible, and to do that we need to restrict access to it.

[inthebrain]

2. I'm just curious how that works

Cause wages themselves don't rise up cause there is some shortage of workers. EMTs, Nurses etc would be millionaires if that were the case.

Wages go up when workers rebel against the capitalist classes and demand better. Supply and Demand is a lousy arguement when it comes to wages because you leave out the effects of collusion, which is widespread ie See Alan Greenspan, that takes place. The capitalist classes are not going to play fair and respect a border.

The borders are there so they can take advantage of the more lax laws on the other side. This is used to convince those with better standards to lower theirs under the guise of the "benefit of shared wealth" between the workers and capitalist classes. Enforcing borders only increases the capitalists bargaining power over the workers.

By your logic, NY should restrict access to new residents as that city is over populated. The only thing that sets NY state apart from other states are the laws contained between imaginary lines. These imaginary lines still work, and have worked, to the bosses benefits for centuries in this country. Corporations force states to lower working standards or threaten to leave.

Imagine you start deporting people because they cross into the wrong state?

No differently than when you do this between countries.

[lumberjack_jeff]

10. "curious" isn't the word that springs to mind. n/t

[inthebrain]

16. Last I checked the guy who's exploitin me ain't the guy

that swam across the Rio Grande.

[lumberjack_jeff]

24. He's the tool of the guy who is exploiting you.

Luckily for him, he has a home to return to once the quality of life on both sides of the border equalize.

[pampango]

6. "Our interest is in keeping our wages as high as possible, and to do that we need to restrict access

to it." That's about as honest an explanation of opposition to immigration as I have seen.

It reminds me that in the days when Blacks and women had restricted access (either due to the law or to cultural traditions) to white collar and good factory jobs in the US, the pay for white men was much better. It was quite common for a family to prosper with just the husband/father working. As access to these jobs was opened up to Blacks and women by changes in the law and cultural expectations, one could argue that wages fell, so that it is difficult for a family to survive one income. (Of course, one could argue the opposite - that the economy benefited from the influx of effort and talent from people who had been kept of the sidelines before.)

The pool of real and potential immigrants from other countries can be viewed as having much the same impact as Blacks and women did fifty years ago. (Of course the law prevents immigrants from legally working here, but that was effectively true in much of the US for women and Blacks back in the day. None of us would now argue that Blacks and women should have restricted access to the workforce in order to improve wages for white men.) As immigrants arrive they do put pressure on wages (as immigrants have for centuries). The question is whether their effort and talent is a net positive to the country in the long run.

Most of us are proud of our country's cultural diversity which is a product of generations of immigration. Perhaps it is easier for us now to feel that way about our history of immigration, since the wage pressure these past immigrants (at least those who immigrated after our ancestors got here) represented was endured by our ancestors, not ourselves. But when it comes to current immigration, many feel the same way that our ancestors felt towards the Irish or Italian or Eastern Europeans or Hispanics or any other group as they arrived in large numbers.

Congratulations for telling it like it is. There has been plenty of anti-immigrant sentiment in the US for centuries and for largely the same reason - they represent pressure on the wages on those of us who preceded them.

[lumberjack_jeff]

8. Those immigrants of the past are now competing with 12 million illegal workers.

Most of whom send their earnings "home" and have no intention of seeking citizenship.

There is no reason for dishonesty. I'm telling it like it is because there's no reason to hide from it. Labor unions improved working conditions for their membership by controlling access to labor.

From the wiki
"Wages and employment
Separate research by both George Borjas, Robert W. Scrivner Professor of Economics and Social Policy at Harvard University and Paul Samuelson, Nobel prize-winning economist from MIT has shown that illegal immigration had a substantial effect on reducing the economic status of U.S. poor while benefiting middle class individuals and wealthier Americans.<99>
Research by George J. Borjas (Robert W. Scrivner Professor of Economics and Social Policy at Harvard University), Jeffrey Grogger (the Irving Harris Professor in Urban Policy in the Harris School at the University of Chicago), and Gordon H. Hanson (the Director of the Center on Pacific Economies and Professor of Economics at UCSD) found that a 10-percent immigrant-induced increase in the supply of a particular skill group reduced the black wage by 4.0 percent, lowered the employment rate of black men by 3.5 percentage points, and increased the incarceration rate of blacks by almost one percent. <100>"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegal_immigration_to_the_United_States#Economic

[pampango]

11. "Labor unions improved working conditions for their membership by controlling access to labor."

Limiting membership to preserve standards (wages) is a tried-and-true approach. As I indicated, in earlier generations Blacks and women were effectively prevented from participating in the good-paying sector of the economy. That made it easier for white men to preserve their hold on the good jobs because they "controlled access" to the sections of the labor market. It was not "right" but it was legal, or at least culturally acceptable for many, many years.

I understand your point that unions improve conditions for their members by controlling access of companies and industries to labor. Unions have continued to do this effectively even given the influx of Blacks and women into the labor force by including them in the unions and bargaining on their behalf.

The influx of "12 million illegal workers" is comparable to the the Great (Black) Migration, (which) was the movement of approximately seven million African-Americans out of the Southern United States to the North, Midwest and West from 1916 to 1930." The population of the country was much less then.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Migration_(African_American)

"While the Great Migration helped educated African Americans obtain jobs, eventually enabling a measure of class mobility, the migrants encountered significant forms of discrimination. Because so many people migrated in a short period of time, the African-American migrants were often resented by the European American working class, fearing their ability to negotiate rates of pay or secure employment, was threatened by the influx of new labor competition. Sometimes those who were most fearful or resentful were the last immigrants of the 19th and new immigrants of the 20th c. In many cities, working classes tried to defend what they saw as "their" territories."

"Nonetheless, African Americans made substantial gains in industrial employment, particularly in the steel, automobile, shipbuilding, and meatpacking industries. Between 1910 and 1920 the number of blacks employed in industry nearly doubled from 500,000 to 901,000.<3> After the Great Depression, more advances took place after workers in the steel and meatpacking industries were organized in labor unions in the 1930s and 1940s, under the interracial Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO). The unions ended segregation of many jobs, and African Americans began to advance into more skilled jobs and supervisory positions."

Unions successfully incorporated blacks into their membership even though these migrants faced many of the same resentments and legal/cultural hurdles that immigrants do today. The same can be done with Hispanic immigrants today. Controlling access to labor may indeed be the source of a union's power, but HOW you control access and whom you include under the union umbrella is also important.

[lumberjack_jeff]

12. It's not comparable at all.

The blacks involved in the great migration were US citizens, legally entitled to the full protection and benefit of our society. They were denied their right to work in the country in which they were citizens.

Hispanic citizens, black citizens, Native American citizens will all benefit from controlling who comes here to work. Those who are not citizens are here at our suffrage. If their presence does not serve citizens interests they can and should be required to leave.

[inthebrain]

14. What makes you think, if they are in fact driving down wages, they are going to be asked to leave

Sorry, but the foxes run the henhouse. America is all about capitalism and there's no way the fixes guarding the henhouse are gonna look out for you interests.

That is if you strongly believe that forcing these people to leave is gonna put more money in the pockets of labor.

The capitalists will again thrive on the division created between labor and exploit those most ripe for the exploitation. So kicking out workers ain't gonna do the trick.

It never does.

I would imagine the capitalists running things would have no problem kicking these people out. They ain't gonna turn around and give you a raise when they do it. They are gonna collude and work even harder to slap you down. Heck, the immigrants they can only fuck with those people so far. Not much you can do to people that don't have much to lose.

Especially when if they start bucking back the worst they have to worry about is being shipped home. Not like the state is gonna waste prison space on them when it can be better put to use for people who live here.

Really, what you're advocating for is no real alternative and the same shit we heard at the turn of the century leading to the great depression. When the immigrants (many of them communists and socialists) started finding common ground with natural born citizens and participated in national strikes, that's when the gummint started limiting them.

Shit, this xenophobic crap ain't gonna help anyone but the bosses. And they know this.

[lumberjack_jeff]

23. Illegal workers aren't "labor" they are scabs.

There is no division within labor, there's labor and there are the illegal workers that the capitalists bring in to depress the value of legitimate labor.

[inthebrain]

28. Unions don't consider immigrants "scabs"

Do you know what a "scab" really is?

[Hello_Kitty]

30. Wages for factory work fell more due to anti-labor policies than the influx of blacks and women

You couldn't get away with paying someone less because of gender or race in a union shop.

The current downward pressure on wages in certain industries is also because of entrenched anti-labor interests (bringing us things like right-to-work, at will employment, opposition to minimum wage increases) that enable employers to pit low skilled workers against each other.

Congratulations for telling it like it is. There has been plenty of anti-immigrant sentiment in the US for centuries and for largely the same reason - they represent pressure on the wages on those of us who preceded them.

You just now figured this out? What did you think DUers' problem was? That they just don't like them thar furriners?

[Hippo_Tron]

18. Xenophobia makes the working classes turn on each other instead of focusing on the capitalists

The modern Republican Party exists because of its ability to convince white working class people that somebody besides the rich are to blame for their troubles. Immigrants are the threat du jour but before that it was environmentalists, "welfare queens", women, you name it. So while the capitalists may like the cheap labor, the immigration debate benefits the capitalists far more than the cheap labor. That's why immigration reform never passed even though the Republicans who represent the capitalists first and foremost were in complete control of the government at the time. The most important thing to them is to keep the masses from turning against them.

[inthebrain]

19. It's not as if this party doesn't have blood on it's hands as well

Bill Clinton was famous for "Reforming Welfare as we know it".

Crap, the Ludlow Massacre ocurred on Woodrow Wilson's watch and he did nothing to ensure justice for the innocent men, women and children that were slaughtered.

The immigration debate itself doesn't take the target off the capitalists. It's the narrow ideas that are used in it in the public forum today that actually takes the target off the capitalist. But hey, they are the ones that put this issue on the table and are offering the alternatives.

To atually hold the immigration debate and explain HOW these narrow ideas go against the working classes and are placed their by the capitalist class benefits workers.

[Hippo_Tron]

20. Wilson doesn't really count, the modern Democratic Party begins with FDR and the New Deal

Woodrow Wilson, while certainly a fascinating figure, has little to do with today's Democratic Party. And Bill Clinton only ended welfare as we know it because of the work that Reagan and the Republicans did to change the country's views about welfare. If there had been no Reagan, there would have been no Welfare Reform. Clinton was only enacting the will of the masses.

But otherwise I agree.

[inthebrain]

21. Or the tyranny of the majority.

[Hippo_Tron]

22. Sure you could definitely call it that

[lumberjack_jeff]

26. For Republicans, concern for US labor is a head-fake.

For Democrats, concern for US labor is fine, provided it doesn't conflict with any other sensitivities.

Between our superficial support for labor and their faux support, labor has no chance.

For Republicans, fences and regulated immigration are not policy goals, they are tactical rhetoric.

[anonymous171]

27. The Democratic Party didn't do much to dissuade them.

Somewhere starting in the 70s the democrats became convinced that there were no poor white people. The white working class interpreted this as elitism. We should be focused on the poor as a whole, not just certain segments of them.

[Hippo_Tron]

29. I agree that we should care about the poor as a whole...

But I don't agree that some time during the 1970's the Democratic Party just stopped caring about poor white people. Poverty does have a racial component and that does need to be addressed. But that doesn't mean that Democrats suddenly stopped caring about poor white people just because they decided to address racial problems. I believe, however, that during the 80's the Democratic Party did take a turn away from representing working people and poor people.

[Anarcho-Socialist]

3. in the present day, xenophobia is an 'information operation'

designed to convince workers that imported foreign labour is the root cause of their poverty, rather than the inevitable outcome of unrestrained capitalism. If anything, off-shoring has been far more damaging to workers' wages than imported labour.

Unequal trade relations between the wealthy nations and the poorer nations mean that many undeveloped countries are willing to be paid a pittance for doing what unionised labour did the First World, without the wage and workplace protections.

There is a direct connection between the outcomes of First World imperialism and the out-sourcing of jobs to the Third World. Imperialism means surplus wealth is siphoned from the Third World and redistributed to the wealthiest in the rich countries, aided of course by foreign policies of rich nation states. While the poorest nations lose control over their own resources (and domestic policy choices - thanks to the IMF) they cannot build up their own industry to First World levels and thus will accept pittance pay from big corporations looking to produce goods and services on the cheap.

Xenophobic sentiment has a part to play since the dominant social and political class have no interest in establishing socialism even in its half-way form of social democracy. Xenophobic sentiment hopes to give workers an 'easy' explanation for their poverty so that they don't demand any structural changes that would redistribute money back away from the rich. This is intended to last until global demand picks up and the economy improves. Then there'll be a repeat in the next bust cycle.

[inthebrain]

15. I agree although it ain't "unrestrained capitalism"

The capitalist system itself, being a pyramid scheme, requires an under class. Also for that underclass to constantly fight amongst itself while create a false sense of superiority through false constructs.

Enter racism and ethnocentrism.

Johnny dishwasher won't feel so bad about his exploitation just so long as he isn't a "wetback", so to speak.

[shellgame26]

4. Xenophobia is good for employers

keep the workers hating those 'other' people then turn around and hire the 'other' ones for less wages. If all workers are brought into the fold then they have to be all treated (and paid) the same. Then, interestingly enough, there would be less incentive to hire a non-American worker.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

5. Banning people willing to do the same jobs for less from entering the country is good for workers.

Or rather, it's good for those workers already in the country; it's bad for those workers banned from entering the country.

Whether or not you think that it's a good thing on balance depends on how much you value the interests of poor Americans against those of really, really poor non-Americans.

[Posteritatis]

13. "poor Americans against ... really, really poor non-Americans"

That's a good way of putting it, I think, and greys up what a lot of people turn into a nice, simple black and white issue a bit. Of course, on this side of the border I could substitute "Canadian" for "American" and get the same thought process..

[inthebrain]

17. Tell that to the railroad workers and the homestead strikers

HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Or the victims of the Ludlow Massacre.

[treestar]

7. The capitalists can always control the workers by getting one half

to hate the other half. It works too often. The workers are forever falling for it. Xenophobia is in now. Also African Americans vs. the white working class. The white working class thinks it has a shot at the top when it really doesn't. (See Joe the Plumber).

And of course the capitalist can always go where they want, while closing borders to the workers. If US workers could just go to India and vice versa whenever they wanted, the wages would equalize. Rather than demand that, the US workers go on an Indian-hating binge as if foreigners should not be allowed to better themselves, falling for the division that the capitalist is sowing.

[lumberjack_jeff]

9. ... better yet, bring in another half. n/t

[anonymous171]

25. Protectionism is a lot easier to pass. nt