No, it's not the same. When other waves of immigrants came in, true, they often displaced the previous group of poor immigrants, who then moved up in neighborhoods and worked even harder, but all of the groups were coming in at a rate and with an interest that allowed them to assimilate far more than the Hispanics do in southern California.
Maybe if you don't live here, you have no idea of the extent of the problem. It is not only a problem for the black community, though the poorer parts of the city are affected most.
There is this horrible myth that the illegals are here to do the work that no one else will do. Nothing could be more of a lie. In any homogeneous country where there is minimal immigration, that country's citizens enjoy having entry level and menial jobs for their teens and elderly to do. I lived in Switzerland for nine years and saw how proud the elderly Swiss were, sweeping the streets or waiting on tables, taking their work seriously and doing a good job of it. All sorts of entry-level jobs were done by students interning while in high school or tech school.
There will always be Americans and legal immigrants willing to watch babies, clean windows, or flip burgers. We do not NEED illegals for anything.
You d*mn right it's a lie : I saw hardworking local people forced out of the meat packing industry here in my hometown, by a variety of measures including draconian enforcement of policies from the management ('looking for excuses to fire people')to violence from the 'imported' workers, much of it sexual violence directed at white female workers especially. The plants went from mostly local (black and white) to at least 75% 'imported' over a 10 year period.
Now here's the weird part : I always assumed it was a cost-saving measure. That the plant management could pay these people minimum wage to $7.00 an hour, as opposed to the $9-13+ the locals had been making . Uh-uh. I was wrong. They are being paid exactly what the locals were making. So why were the locals forced out? Were the trying to unionize? Did they complain about management positions going to college graduates from the outside, rather than to people working their way up? Is it some kind of social security/health insurance scam ? I don't know. .
I do know this : The people in HS that planned to go directly to the plants after graduation were proud of how they'd be independent and able to support a family so quickly. They were NOT "too proud and lazy" to work there. Maybe things are different in the small town midwest, but around here all the cashiers, hotel cleaning ladies, fast food employees etc are local people teens and up, white-black-other. They do a good job and are usually polite and friendly I wonder how long they'll be allowed to keep these jobs.
I am convinced that the people in the media who say that "illegal immigrants are only doing the jobs Americans are too proud and lazy to do" are speaking in code, and what they're thinking is,"So what if Americans who were doing crappy factory or service jobs starve or work 3 part time jobs to survive!???!! They didn't have college degrees! They probably live in trailers, for pity's sake! They don't count as human beings!" I wonder how many of the people who parrot that line of BS also think that way...al least a few, I'm sure.