Different Slants

On the one side, there’s a corrupt alliance between big business, agricultural interests, and the “old boy” wing of the Republican party which would like nothing better than to have an endless supply of cheap labor, that they can exploit and enrich themselves with.

On the other side, there’s liberals and activists who view the cause of the migrant worker getting ten times the wages he could get in Mexico as a major civil rights issue, one in which in their serene and unfounded sense of superiority gives them the standing to deride as racist and Neanderthal anyone who points out that there is no entitlement for anyone to cross the border and make themselves at home in this country and start demanding things of those that legitimately live here.

A pox on both their houses!

President Bush is right that we need a guest worker program (remember the Sicilian tradition of spitting after speaking the name of the rival Don? I just spit.). In no way should that be linked to anything else like “a path to citizenship” or benefits that many Americans don’t have. His proposed guest worker program (as best I understand it) is fatally flawed because it links in too many other things.

Let’s just have a guest worker program, period. It’s obvious there’s work here needing to be done. The details are always negotiable, but for starters here’s mine:

* There’s no reason to make everyone return to their native country to apply. Guest worker permits should be available both here and in the native country. The purpose is get persons who’re working hard into the program.

* Experts in Labor Law need to write up the ground rules for the Guest Worker (GW) program. No GW should be put in a position to be exploited, but no GW should have full access to our litigious judicial system either. Permits should be revoked quickly and without emotion and deportations be automatic with very limited appeals for GWs who violate laws. Employers who exploit any worker should be prosecuted.

* GWs are not entitled to free schooling and free medical care. (See below: children of GWs need to be schooled in their native country). If a bill is run up for emergency care, that should be paid first by the GW (if he wants to stay in the GW program), and — if an unpaid bill is left by a deported former GW, the bill should be sent to the government of his native country. If the government of his native country doesn’t agree to accept responsibility, the bill should be paid out of increased tariffs or reduced aid to that country. It isn’t right to allow our emergency rooms to go insolvent and shut down as a consequence of our being generous to a poor and corrupt neighboring country!

* Let GWs pay the 7.45% FICA/Medicare tax everyone else pays but for them, call it a “Guest tax”. This means they don’t get any credit for it in the Social Security system. It’s just gone, thank you very much. Employers would pay their portion directly into the SS system and it would go to help restoring it to solvency. The employee portion would go to paying for the costs of administering the GW program, and the rest would go to Social Security solvency.

* After, say 12 years, eligibility for GW permits would end, and GWs would return to their native country, or, they could apply for permanent residency. Granting of permanent residency would be done using the same criteria we use now – it would have absolutely nothing to do with the GW program. If Congress is in a generous mood and doesn’t fear voters’ wrath they could bump up the quotas in the future but that’s a separate issue. The 12 years begin when the GW permit is first issued — if someone was here for 15 years before that, why bother trying to track that? That’s water under the bridge. If someone tries to stall getting their first GW permit, to extend that eventual 12 year expiration date, we prevent that by making the first GW permit, if granted in the US, start its clock ticking on a fixed date even if the permit is applied for later.

* Laws against hiring illegal aliens must be rigorously enforced. The government needs to provide a system where checking status of persons applying for work is easy. This is critical for this to work.

* There’s no point in prosecuting or trying to fine people who’re here now, having come illegally, once they acquire a GW permit and are “legal”. Is this amnesty? The question doesn’t interest me. This is practicality, not ideology.

* Anyone caught illegally in the country for any reason, after the start of this program, should be permanently ineligible for the GW program as well as residency, or citizenship.

* No guest worker should be allowed to bring their families over, unless those persons are also GWs. I see this as a surrepticious way to put down roots here without going through the process fully. For the cases where an illegal alien has a family already here, some time and slack and maybe even some assistance should be given to them to move back to their native country.

(Note: I would amend the Constitution to not grant citizenship automatically to anyone born in this country whose parents are not citizens, and make that retroactive to anyone who’s under 18 at the time of ratification — but more about that later).

I hope this proposal is a practical mix of generosity and strictness, trying to get to a just and achievable outcome. If it pisses off both sides, it probably is aimed in the right direction.