http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/201 … t-congressThe "gang of eight," a bipartisan group of senators who have been working since November to secure a temporary worker program to appease both the business community and labor unions, scored a big victory over the weekend when the AFL-CIO and Chamber of Commerce struck a deal on a contentious low-skilled worker visa program. But everyone from Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., to NumbersUSA, a group that would like to see tighter controls on immigration, warn there are still many mountains to climb before reform is final.
While much has been made of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the U.S. and if they should receive a "path to citizenship," lawmakers who have fought previous immigration battles say figuring out how to determine the number of low-skilled workers who will be allowed to enter the country has been the real poison pill that has killed prior negotiations.
"I think it is the biggest single area where immigration reform could have floundered. It has historically been the problem with immigration reform," says Brent Wilkes, the National Executive Director of the League of United Latin American Citizens. "This [agreement] is definitely on track to be the strongest effort for decades."
The compromise would create a new "W-visa" program slated to begin in 2015. Immigrants who work in lesser-skilled non-agricultural jobs, such as janitors, retail, construction workers and hospitality employees would be eligible for the program.
"We have created a new model, a modern visa system that includes both a bureau to collect and analyze labor market data, as well as significant worker protections," Richard Trumka, leader of the AFL-CIO, said in a released statement. "We expect that this new program, which benefits not just business, but everyone, will promote long overdue reforms by raising the bar for existing programs."
The proposal sets up a mechanism to manage the influx of future immigrants and creates a new Bureau of Immigration and Labor Market Research, an independent entity within U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services.
The agency's job will be to set caps on how many workers will receive the visas each year, as well as study the impact immigrants have on the country's economy.
The bureau is slated to give out 20,000 visas in the first year, increasing to 75,000 visas over a four-year span. The bureau will use an economic formula to determine how many workers the country's economy can support in the fifth year, with the number of visas never dropping below 20,000 or climbing higher than 200,000.
While low skilled workers will be able to apply for these they will all mostly be gobbled up by high skilled engineers and others. This is good. I think we should also give out visas to people who complete STEM degrees in U.S. colleges. We need as many of those people as possible. It will also be good for America if we increase the amount of East Asian and Indian Americans through immigration. They will contribute well to America's rich tapestry.
Last edited by Macbeth (2013-04-02 10:44:42)