Free Republic

Ever since President Bush unveiled his first guest worker plan, employer claims of labor shortages have dominated the economic side of the national immigration debate. Moreover, as Bush and his allies keep repeating, legal and illegal immigrants alike are mainly doing "the jobs Americans won't do" – physically demanding labor in low-paying but essential industries. However, the most important statistics available show conclusively that, far from easing shortages, illegal immigrants are adding to labor gluts in America. Specifically, when adjusted for inflation, wages in sectors that are highly dependent on illegals have either been stagnant or have actually fallen. When...

COVERT, Mich. - The Nuclear Regulatory Commission launched a special inspection at the Palisades Nuclear Plant after several workers were exposed to radiation, officials said Thursday. The workers were not expected to suffer any adverse health effects and no medical treatment was necessary, the agency said in a statement. About six workers were handling a two-part storage container underwater in the refueling area early Wednesday when an inner portion of the container briefly rose to the surface, the NRC said. The employees were exposed to radiation emitted from highly radioactive equipment inside the container. According to radiation detectors worn by...

Ninety workers of the PARS IRAN textile company who have not been paid in more than 14 months in a letter to Ahmadinejad demanded that the he investigate and resolve their labour issues. The regime-run news agency ILNA printed the letter which also indicated: "We the workers of the PARS IRAN textile company of the province of Gilan (also known as Rasht) have been laid off for 10 months now and have not received our salaries for over 14 months. Our employer also owes us our severance package as well as all other legal benefits, totaling to more than $5500...

NEW YORK - The majority of American workers think they'll be able to retire comfortably, but most aren't saving nearly enough to meet that goal, according to a new study. The Employee Benefit Research Institute's annual retirement confidence survey, released Tuesday, found that about 68 percent of workers are confident about having adequate funds for a comfortable retirement, up slightly from 65 percent in 2005. At the same time, more than half of all workers say they've saved less than $25,000 toward retirement, according to the Washington, D.C., based research group. Even among workers 55 and older, more than four...

by Edward Hudgins, Executive Director, The Objectivist Center & Atlas Society. ehudgins@objectivistcenter.org We can always count on the French to show us how holding the wrong moral values and following the wrong economic policies will produce a comedie that becomes tres tragique. Hundreds of thousands of students have been taking to the streets from Paris to Lyon demonstrating and rioting against a new labor law that will allow employers to dismiss without cause employees 26 years old or younger within the first two years of being hired. France has some of Europe's most stringent laws restricting the freedom of employers...

By Bob Haran; The recent marches in opposition to Rep. James Sensenbrener’s bill, H.R. 4437, that would make it a felony to be in the country illegally, has raised a question in my mind. Why don't we make the people responsible for causing people to enter our country illegally, felons? Congress should amend H.R. 4437 and instead of making it a felony to be in the country illegally, make it a felony to illegally hire someone in the country illegally. To make people who are for the most part, law abiding, into felons, is ludicrous. Why does our government refuse...

Riot by migrant workers halts construction of Dubai skyscraper Brian Whitaker and agencies Thursday March 23, 2006 The Guardian (UK) Construction of what is expected to be the world's tallest building was halted yesterday after 2,500 workers in Dubai rioted over pay and conditions, causing damage estimated at £500,000. The trouble broke out on Tuesday night when buses due to take labourers to a residential camp at the end of their shift were delayed, witnesses said. Workers from the Burj Dubai tower site and surrounding housing developments then chased and assaulted security officers, broke into offices, smashed computers and files,...

DUBAI - Construction on a building expected to be the world’s tallest was interrupted on Wednesday after Asian workers angered by low salaries and mistreatment rioted, smashing cars and offices and causing what a government official said almost US$1 million in damage. The stoppage triggered a sympathy strike at Dubai International Airport also Wednesday, when thousands of labourers building a massive new terminal also laid down their tools, airport and labour officials said. Some 2,500 workers on the emerging Burj Dubai tower and surrounding housing developments chased and beat security officers Tuesday night, broke into temporary offices and smashed computers...

THE offices of the Ministry of Labour received 2,970 reports about 5,333 workers in the first two weeks of March. About 2,094 reports were about absconding of 4,364 workers and 878 about ban notification to 969 workers. Dubai topped the absconding list with 1,880 workers, followed by Abu Dhabi with 996 and Sharjah 838.

Dubai: Many workers are living in harsh poverty, after filing court cases against their employers, because they were not told they may temporarily work, with labour ministry permission. There are no available statistics on how many labour cases there are at Dubai court, or how long they take to resolve. However, workers with complaints in the labour courts have said cases take can take from four months to years, depending on appeals. During that time, many workers are living in abject poverty. They include 26 Indian workers living in the Sharjah Industrial Area, without electricity for the past week. The...

Rebels seize oil workers in Nigeria Tom Ashby in Lagos Sunday February 19, 2006 The Observer (UK) Nine foreign oil workers were kidnapped by armed militants in Nigeria yesterday in a series of attacks that also saw a tanker terminal bombed and two pipelines sabotaged. The raids came after the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta announced it was declaring war on all foreign oil interests in the region in response to helicopter gunship attacks on villagers last week. The militants stormed a pipe-laying barge operated by the US firm Willbros and abducted nine workers, including a Briton,...

China workers killed in Pakistan Three Chinese engineers have been killed by gunmen in Pakistan's troubled south-western province of Balochistan, police have said. Their Pakistani driver also died in the attack in the town of Hab, near Karachi. The engineers had worked at a local cement plant, police said. Unconfirmed reports say the Baloch Liberation Army claimed the attack. Chinese workers have been targeted in recent years by local militants involved in a long-running insurgency. Pakistan's government condemned the killings as an "act of terrorism" aimed at harming ties with China and promised all measures to prevent such acts in...

Sarkozy unveils new laws to expel foreign workers By Henry Samuel in Paris (Filed: 07/02/2006) Nicolas Sarkozy, France's interior minister and presidential hopeful, has unveiled tougher rules on immigration, making it easier to expel foreign workers or those refusing to integrate. The proposals included in a draft law, which Mr Sarkozy will present to the cabinet on Thursday, aim to change the very nature of immigration into France. Mr Sarkozy: hard-line "We no longer want immigration that is inflicted [on us]," he said. "We want selected immigration. The system of integration the French way no longer works," he told Le...

It is time for those of us on the Right to choose a new vocabulary. I am tired using the vocabulary of the Left. I am especially talking about the ubiquitous use of the term “workers,” which is a Marxist term. It has been selected consciously by the press and the Left because of that origin and the connotations it carries with it. I have never considered myself as a “worker.” Ants are workers, drones are workers, people are employees, or if they have a trade they are artisans, craftsmen, or tradesmen. The true synonyms for “worker” are proletarian (or...

BAQUBAH, Iraq (Army News Service, Jan. 27, 2006) – The first aid skills of a U.S. Soldier were put to the test during a mortar attack on a U.S. base Jan. 6. A Pakistani national, who works at the Forward Operating Base Warhorse Post Exchange, suffered a deep injury to his right arm from shrapnel during the attack and was bleeding profusely. “I rushed to his aid, followed by some Soldiers behind me,” said Sgt. Maj. Guadalupe Aldama, operations sergeant major for 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, 4th Infantry Division. “We tried to stop the bleeding by applying direct pressure...

(AP) LOS ANGELES The immigrant day laborers who wait for work on street corners across the United States have families and attend church regularly, and the people who hire them are more likely to be individual homeowners than construction contractors. The first nationwide study of day laborers also found that one in five has been injured on the job and nearly half have been cheated out of pay. The study, the most detailed snapshot to date of the mostly Hispanic and often undocumented immigrants who've become a focal point in the immigration debate, was based on interviews of 2,660 workers...

AP Middle-Class Job Losses Batter Workforce Sunday January 1, 8:53 pm ET By Kathy Barks Hoffman, Associated Press Writer Middle-Class Job Losses Batter Workforce As Companies Slash Payrolls, Send Jobs Overseas LANSING, Mich. (AP) -- Thirty years ago, Dan Fairbanks looked at the jobs he could get with his college degree and what he could make working the line at General Motors Corp., and decided the GM job looked better. He still thinks he made the right choice. But with GM planning to end production of the Chevrolet SSR and shut down the Lansing Craft Centre where he works sometime...

WASHINGTON (AP) - A Senate-passed measure to add more visas for foreign workers in high-tech and specialty fields was dropped from a budget bill that passed the House early Monday, disappointing high-tech and manufacturing firms in search of skilled workers. The Senate plan would have allowed 30,000 more of the popular H1-B visas each year, and increased fees for those visas to help trim the budget deficit. Congress capped the six-year H-1B visas at 65,000 per year in 2004, and that cap has already been reached for the 2006 fiscal year that began Oct. 1. The Senate language also would...

WASHINGTON, D.C. (December 8, 2005) – Stefan Gleason, Vice President of the National Right to Work Foundation, a non-profit charitable organization that provides free legal aid to employees suffering from compulsory unionism abuses, made the following statement in response to today’s so-called “International Human Rights Day” rally, organized by AFL-CIO officials:[excerpts] ----- “Orchestrated to invoke the sympathy of the American people, this one-sided media-blitz ignores the widespread abuse of employees who choose to refrain from union affiliation. Big Labor is trying to build public support for the enactment of a new wave of coercive union ‘organizing’ privileges." ----- “Since employees...

SAN DIEGO (AP) - Immigration authorities raided the offices of a Southern California fencing company Wednesday, seizing boxes of documents and arresting 17 employees who are believed to be in the United States illegally. Golden State Fence Co. had rehired some of the 17 employees who were arrested despite previous warnings by federal authorities that they were ineligible to work, officials with the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement bureau said in a press release. Authorities searched company offices in Riverside, where the company is based, and in Oceanside, about 35 miles north of San Diego. All 17...