The jobs Americans won’t do
Job Fight: Immigrants vs. Locals:
Hard times recently drew scores of locals and immigrants to a cold sidewalk in this town, where they spent an anxious night waiting to compete for jobs in a slaughterhouse.
Burmese refugee Cho Aye traveled 60 miles from Nashville on a Thursday morning in late March to take a place at the head of the line outside Shelbyville’s state employment office. The next day, the office was to take applications for $9.35-an-hour jobs processing chicken at the local Tyson Foods plant. Directly behind Ms. Aye, sitting on blankets atop the concrete, were 16 more Burmese refugees who had come from as far away as Idaho and Florida.
“I don’t mind doing any kind of work,” Ms. Aye, a petite 22-year-old, said that evening as she settled into a reclining beach chair she bought at Goodwill.
Farther back in the line, marked by orange tape and monitored by police, locals like David Curtis seethed. “This is the worst job I have ever applied for,” said the 31-year-old welder, who had already failed to find work at a convenience store, a pen factory and a Pizza Hut. Eyeing those ahead of him, he added: “I’m very annoyed foreigners are taking jobs that Americans need.”
Slaughterhouse jobs can be difficult and dangerous. Now, with U.S. unemployment at a 25-year high, they are also fiercely coveted. American workers — who for years have largely avoided fruit-picking, office-cleaning and meat-processing shifts — are increasingly vying for these jobs with immigrants, creating flashpoints in places like Shelbyville.
We didn’t need to do manual labor when we all got rich sucking equity out of our skyrocketing houses and selling cars, boats, and RVs to each other. After the bubble, it’s back to reality. Nothing wrong with honest work.
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May 24th, 2009 at 9:32 am
But I thought we were a nation of immigrants, and these people have a right to make their lives better.
Also, don’t forget: Bush said this is what’s right for America.
May 24th, 2009 at 11:00 am
I think you are assuming that they are illegal.
Since they are Burmese ‘refugees’, I don’t think they are illegal. They certainly didn’t walk across the border.
And if they are legal immigrants, they have same right to compete for a job as any other American.
May 24th, 2009 at 11:54 am
MCain said Americans wouldn’t pick lettuce for even $50 an hour.
May 24th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Yes, and then McCain got rewarded for it by being the party nominee.
As Schiller said, “With stupidity the gods themselves contend in vain.”
May 24th, 2009 at 12:59 pm
There are only 30K Burmese living in the U.S.
I really can’t blame them for trying to get here either.
May 24th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
I also see Feinstein and others are trying to bring back AgJobs.
May 24th, 2009 at 2:22 pm
And if they are legal immigrants, they have same right to compete for a job as any other American.~~~drood
Why should foreigners come first?? why impot foreigners with joib scarce. Le them refugee somewhere else. Why here??
May 24th, 2009 at 2:40 pm
drood is right in that Burmese are probably here legally, if they are not overstaying their visas.
Nevertheless, the jobs should go to Americans, and the Burmese sent back if they are overstaying their Visas, although their country is hell.
May 24th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Then you have a problem with the policies of this country granting refugee status, IP.
I’m entirely sympathetic to your position–I was just making the point that these refugees are in fact legal immigrants (as long as they have not overstayed their visas, as rwy points out–or committed crimes or in some other way violated their visa status).
May 24th, 2009 at 3:04 pm
Personally I feel that granting refugee status to relatively small numbers of immigrants from terribly oppressed countries is perfectly in line with the tradition of this nation.
The problem is the hordes of law-breaking illegals who simply cross into the country, most from Mexico, but many other nationalities as well streaming across the unguarded southern and northern borders (including some likely terrorists).
May 24th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
I don’t have a problem with LEGAL immigrants or refugees. If they’re here legally then they have every right to look for work and compete.
We may have to re-think granting more applicants a refugee status if the unemployment keeps getting worse though.
May 24th, 2009 at 4:13 pm
When the boat is sinking,why take on more water?? We aren’t the only country in the world. We take in more “immigrants” than any other country. There has to be a limit.
May 24th, 2009 at 5:23 pm
Burma is the exception to the rules.
Are all 60 million of them going to come here if we decided to be really lax and make an exception for them? No, because they don’t have any money to get here even if they wanted. In fact, they don’t even allow internet, xerox, or fax machines in that country without a military permit so even if there was a rule to be exploited and they had the money to exploit it, they wouldn’t know about it anyway.
October 13th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
We have the same issue here in Australia, especially as there is less unemployment it has been hard in fast to find local office cleaners to hire but is now many workers from overseas.
November 23rd, 2009 at 10:51 am
Thanks for the sharing. We were looking for this!