Guest Workers Are at Crux of Groups’ Deal on Immigration
Published: March 29, 2013 - New York Times
WASHINGTON — The nation’s top business and labor
groups were near agreement Friday on a guest worker program for low-skilled
immigrants, closing in on a deal that would eliminate one of the last
significant obstacles to a new proposal for a broad overhaul of immigration
laws, officials involved in the talks said.
The progress in the talks, which stalled late last
week, had members of a bipartisan group of eight senators that has been working
on an immigration bill increasingly optimistic that they would be able to
introduce comprehensive legislation in the Senate when Congress returns the
second week of April.
“We are very close, closer than we’ve ever been,” said
Senator Charles E. Schumer, Democrat of New York and a member of the Senate
group. “We are very optimistic, but there are a few issues remaining.”
The intense talks, and the willingness of the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce and the A.F.L.-C.I.O. — two groups that have often found
themselves deeply divided over the immigration debate — to try to hammer out an
agreement, was an indication of how much the climate has changed on overhauling
the nation’s immigration laws.
When President George W. Bush pushed to revamp
immigration laws in 2007, the inability of business and labor to agree on a plan
for temporary guest workers was among the main reasons that effort failed. But
now the two groups have weathered leaks to the news media and other setbacks in
a sign of how serious both Democrats and Republicans are about getting a bill on
President Obama’s desk by the end of the year.
Some involved in the negotiations remained hopeful
that a deal would be reached by the weekend, but the Congressional recess, along
with the Good Friday observance, made it difficult to lock all the moving pieces
in place, those close to the talks said. And, while the members of the
bipartisan group were optimistic, aides cautioned that no deal would be final
until all the senators had signed off on every piece of the legislation.
The Chamber of
Commerce and the A.F.L.-C.I.O., the
nation’s main federation of labor unions, have been in discussions parallel to
those of the Senate group, and have already reached a tentative agreement about
the size and scope of a temporary guest worker program, which would grant up to
200,000 new visas annually for low-skilled workers. The labor-business talks came
close to breaking down last Friday, on the eve of a two-week Congressional
recess, over the issue of what the pay levels should be for low-skilled
immigrants — often employed at restaurants and hotels or on construction
projects — who could be brought in when employers said they faced labor
shortages.
One of the last sticking points in the business-labor
negotiations has been the specific type of jobs that would be excluded from the
program. The nation’s construction unions, officials in the talks said, have
persuaded the negotiators to exclude certain higher-skilled jobs, including
crane operators and electricians, from the guest worker program.
Eliseo
Medina, the secretary-treasurer of the Service Employees International Union
and one of labor’s most influential voices on immigration issues, said, “We may
be very close to a point where the senators will have an announcement soon.”
The tentative agreement seems to satisfy both groups:
The business community is likely to see a number of visas that it considers
adequate, while the agreement on wages is likely to please labor because it is
not expected to affect the labor market adversely.
“The labor movement has been united in making sure
aspiring Americans get a road map to citizenship and that any future flow
program doesn’t reduce wages for any local workers,” said Tom Snyder, manager of
the A.F.L.-C.I.O.’s Citizenship Now campaign. “And we will succeed on both
fronts because politicians have heard immigrant communities loud and clear:
citizenship now.”
Still, Randy Johnson, the senior vice president for
labor, immigration, and employee benefits at the Chamber of Commerce, cautioned
that any official agreement would come from the bipartisan Senate group.
“We advise senators on the Hill how to write the bill,
and they decide on what bill would make sound legislation,” he said.
According to participants in the conversations, after
the business-labor talks came close to breaking down last week, some union
officials pressed the labor negotiators to show more flexibility to avoid losing
momentum over the guest worker issue. At the same time, some business leaders
and Republican lawmakers pressed the Chamber to be more flexible on the guest
worker issue so as not to derail the overall immigration overhaul.
Business and labor reached agreement in recent days on
the contentious issue of how many guest workers would be admitted each year,
several officials said. They said the number would start at 20,000 visas a year
and could grow to a maximum of 200,000 annually.
“There is a formula that will allow it to grow and
shrink according to economic needs,” said Tamar Jacoby, the president of ImmigrationWorks, a group that
represents small businesses on immigration matters.
She said the formula agreed to was not flexible enough
to meet the needs of specific industries in specific places.
The number of guest workers allowed in would increase
as the nation’s unemployment rate fell and the number of job openings increased.
A federal commission would also assess the need for guest workers, with an eye
to shortages in specific industries and communities.
In the negotiations, business vigorously objected to
labor’s push to have employers pay guest workers more than they pay local
workers — an idea labor pushed to encourage employers to increase wages and to
discourage them from bringing in guest workers.
To settle that dispute, officials said, the two sides
agreed that guest workers would be paid the prevailing industry wage previously
used in the guest worker program. These officials said that employers who faced
a labor shortage even after the national guest worker quota was filled could
request a “safety valve” exemption to bring in workers, but with additional
administrative hurdles and at a higher wage rate than the prevailing wage.
“Business and labor leaders both agree that we need a
system that responds to the needs of our economy, and we are now in a position
where they’re both coming together around key reforms that will fix the broken
immigration system and move our economy forward,” said John Feinblatt, the chief
policy adviser to Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg of New York and the chairman of the
Partnership
for a New American Economy.