Unemployment Among Black Americans
Many pro-amnesty advocates claim that "comprehensive immigration reform" is the "civil rights test of our generation."
NumbersUSA contents that there is little comparison between the struggle of descendants of American slaves to gain equal standing and the desire of illegal aliens to be rewarded for breaking immigration laws.
Primary Victims of Unsustainable Immigration Policies
Less-educated and younger U.S.-born workers are the primary victims of unsustainable immigration policies because they face the most competition from immigrant labor: 74 percent of working-age illegal immigrants, and 46 percent of working-age legal immigrants have no education beyond high school (Pew Hispanic Center, Figure 16).
Americans who tend to be in the most direct competition with illegal workers for jobs in construction, service, transportation and manufacturing are Americans under the age of 30 without college education. It is these young jobless Americans who likely would benefit the most by the passage of the SAVE Act.
The official U-6 category of unemployment has shown explosive rates for young adults aged 18 through 29.
Those unemployment rates for workers who want a full-time job but can't find one have been running around:
30% -- for all persons in the U.S. aged 18-29 without college
35% -- for Hispanic Americans in that group
40% -- for Black Americans in that group
Among teenagers aged 16-17, the unemployment rate is even worse . . .
. . . and has risen to historic highs for those wanting a full-time job but unable to find one. The unemployment rates have been running around:
40% -- for all teens in the U.S.
45% -- for Hispanic American teens
55% -- for Black American teen
Illegal immigration is not the sole or primary cause of these horrendous unemployment rates. But millions of these unemployed Americans -- both U.S.-born and foreign-born -- would cease to be jobless if illegal foreign workers were moved out of their non-agricultural jobs.
SOURCE: http://cis.org/bad-to-worse, "From Bad to Worse: Unemployment and Underemployment Among Less-Educated U.S.-Born Workers, 2007 to 2010," by Dr. Steven A. Camarota, Center for Immigration Studies, "Table 2: U-6 Measure for Immigrants and Native-Born Americans," based on Current Population Surveys.
Frank L. Morris Sr., former executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation
"....During the 2000s, the growth of our labor force - fueled by the highest levels of legal and illegal immigration in our nation's history - outpaced the growth of jobs in our economy. As often has been the case throughout history, it is black workers who have suffered the most....
"....Latinos and other immigrants are not entirely to blame for unemployment that disproportionately afflicts black Americans. Rather, it is immigration policies that ignore the profound impact of millions of people entering our country - legally and illegally - that are a huge part of the problem.
"Rather than compounding the damage that ill-conceived and unenforced immigration policies have inflicted on Americans generally and black Americans particularly, it is time for the CBC and America's first black president to confront and reform those policies. Reducing immigration to the United States and enforcing laws intended to protect the interests of American workers are not only the right things to do, they are the only viable things to do given the fiscal realities our nation is facing.
"Reforming America's dysfunctional immigration policies and enforcing laws against illegal immigration will not magically cure unemployment and other problems in the black community. But, under current circumstances, there is likely nothing that the CBC and Mr. Obama could do that would have more immediate or beneficial impact on black Americans. Sadly, it is a step that black congressional leaders and the White House are unlikely to take."
-Washington Times op-ed, March 22, 2010