DALLAS (Reuters) - Over the past two years, as U.S. unemployment remained near double-digit levels and the economy shed jobs in the wake of the financial crisis, over a million foreign-born arrivals to America found work, many illegally.
Those are among the findings of a review of U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and Census Bureau data conducted exclusively for Reuters by researchers at the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston.
Often young and unskilled or semi-skilled, immigrants have taken jobs Americans could do in areas like construction, willing to work for less wages. Others land jobs that unemployed Americans turn up their noses at or lack the skills to do.
With a national unemployment rate of 9.4 percent, domestic job creation is at the top of President Barack Obama's agenda and such findings could add to calls to tighten up on illegal immigration. But much of it is Hispanic and the growing Latino vote is a key base for Obama's Democratic Party.
Many of the new arrivals, according to employers, brought with them skills required of the building trade and found work in sectors such as construction, where jobless rates are high.
"Employers have chosen to use new immigrants over native-born workers and have continued to displace large numbers of blue-collar workers and young adults without college degrees," said Andrew Sum, the director of the Center for Labor Market Studies.
"One of the advantages of hiring, particularly young, undocumented immigrants, is the fact that employers do not have to pay health benefits or basic payroll taxes," said Sum.
Bailey: The sentence above that I marked red is written by a person who apparently has never worked a regular job in America!
Americans do not turn up their noses at any job! If we don't take one it's because we're searching for jobs that pay enough to support our families here in America. The average American household usually consist of the Husband, Wife, and Children. That means there are only two people working and paying all the bills to support that family.
When illegals come over they will live together in one house (6 or 8) splitting all of the bills among themselves. Most of the time paying only 10% of what the average American Family has to spend on utilities, water, rent, etc. And on top of all that for some reason the illegals are able to get all of the government benefits that are denied to the struggling American. Hell yeah! I would take a cheaper paying job if I had 6 or 8 complete strangers living in my house with me and my family splitting the bills!
