by | ARTICLES, BLOG, CONSTITUTION, ECONOMY, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, HYPOCRISY, OBAMA, OBAMACARE, POLITICS, TAXES
Congressman Dave Brat wrote a stunning Op-ed in the Richmond Times Dispatch (“Immigration is killing Americans’ job prospects“) in which he blames immigrants — both legal and illegal — for the current anemic economy. Rightly citing “meager job growth” and “stagnant wages” as symptoms, he then makes a crass and erroneous conclusion that the problem is immigration.
Immigration is not killing Americans’ job prospects — government policy is. We all know that. Why does Congressman Brat ignore the elephant in the room? Brat talks about statistics and “jobs availability” as if the economy was a zero-sum endeavor and there is a finite amount of jobs available to go around, from which outsiders are taking more than their fair share. That’s absurd.
The reality is that job creation and growth by businesses — signs of a healthy economy — have slowed to a crawl because of 1) excessive and onerous regulations unleashed in the last several years; 2) increased taxes, and the high corporate tax rate; 3) overreaching agencies such as the NLRB and EPA; 4) Obamacare; and so forth.
These are all aggressive, anti-business policies that small and large businesses have had to increasingly contend with in our country. They are the reasons why more businesses are closing than opening and investment has declined. Businesses can’t afford to stay in business, comply with government diktats, and create new jobs.
To go after legal and illegal immigration while simultaneously ignoring the government’s culpability is disingenuous at best and pandering at worst. With a diatribe that strenuously complains about “the presence and availability of immigrants — whether legal or illegal, permanent or temporary — in the job market,” Congressman Brat sounds like he may be setting us up for a Trump endorsement down the road; such a line of ridiculous thinking is more compatible with Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan than any rational, logical economist — which is what Brat purports to be.
by | ARTICLES, BLOG, BUSINESS, CONSTITUTION, ECONOMY, OBAMA, OBAMACARE, POLITICS, TAX TIPS, TAXES
The Wall Street Journal put together an excellent editorial yesterday on the intersection of Obamacare and immigration.
First, starting in 2016, employers with 50 or more full time employees are required to offer health insurance for each of their workers, or else pay a penalty of $3,000 per each person who fails to receive proper Obamacare coverage.
So what happens with the undocumented immigrants allowed to stay under President Obama’s Executive Action? The numbers are estimated to be upwards of 5 million people.
“The government’s petition says that the executive action intended to provide ‘work authorizations’ so that undocumented immigrants could find jobs in the U.S. without working illegally for less than market wages, which might harm American workers. But wait: Employers aren’t required to offer ObamaCare coverage or subsidies to these immigrants. The statutory language in the Affordable Care Act says that only ‘lawful residents’ are eligible, and the government’s petition specifically notes that the immigration action does not ‘confer any form of legal status in this country.'”
Therefore, the immigrants (with deferred deportation), are exempt from Obamacare. While that may be good for the taxpayer, it is not necessarily good news for the worker. From a purely financial perspective, companies could easily save the $3000 penalty cost per worker if they hire and employ an Obamacare-exempt immigrant instead of a citizen/resident subject to the Obamacare rules.
The Wall Street Journal sums up the scenario nicely:
“Suppose businesses subject to ObamaCare employ only 40%, or two million, of the up to five million immigrants covered by the president’s executive action. At $3,000 an employee, businesses would save about $6 billion a year. Companies already dealing with the added expense of operating in the Obama economy — burdened by regulations, high taxes and other barnacles — would find those savings hard to pass up.”
Exempting employers who hire these immigrants from the law’s penalties gives the immigrants a distinct market advantage over U.S. citizens. That flies in the face of the president’s statement that his executive action would not “stick it to the middle class” by allowing these individuals to “take our jobs.” It is also contrary to the government’s statement that the executive action would make it less likely that these undocumented immigrants hurt American workers by “illegally” working “for below market rates.” They could still work at below-market rates, only it would be legal.
All of this was inevitable. The root problem with ObamaCare is that one party rammed it through Congress without a single Republican vote, while the law’s supporters didn’t even read it, let alone vet it through congressional committees. As a result, ObamaCare as written was unworkable, and the administration has had to repeatedly amend it by constitutionally dubious executive fiat.
Now this flawed law is clashing with yet another constitutionally dubious executive action that the administration couldn’t be bothered to pass through the legislature.”
The Obama Administration may yet decide to grant Obamacare to these immigrants currently exempted. But for the time being, since their status presents a situation may wreak havoc in the business world, leaving the current court injunction against the immigration order in place is the only suitable solution until the Obamacare-immigration situation is sorted out. Otherwise, expect the economy to continue to weaken from this latest threat.
by | ARTICLES, ELECTIONS, FREEDOM, GOVERNMENT, OBAMA, POLITICS, TAXES
One month ago (in June), the topic of immigration was at 5%.
Today? It’s 17%. According to a Gallup poll released a few days ago, immigration has surged to the top of the list as “the Most Important U.S. Problem”. This replaces “dissatisfaction with government” (16%).
Two other tidbits to glean from this poll: (1) the issue is higher among Republicans (23%) than Democrats (11%); and (2) older Americans (over 50) are more likely than younger Americans (under 50) to cite immigration as the top issue.
So, while this poll shows us what Americans are now talking about, even more importantly is what they aren’t talking about anymore — major scandals such as those involving the IRS, the VA, and even the situation in Iraq, among others (most of those can probably be filed under “dissatisfaction with government”).
The IRS and VA scandals are particularly scathing to the administration. Is it any wonder why, at the very time when the heat began to turn up on these two issues, the immigration surge began. Those very demographics — Republicans and older Americans — who are most likely to be incensed at the IRS and VA scandals are now the ones even more incensed at the immigration issue…so that they are no longer focused on the IRS and VA.
The poll concluded: “the fact that the issue is of particular concern to Republicans and older Americans — both groups that Republicans need to turn out in force in the midterms — could be critical to the outcome.”
The poll is likely correct, but in a different sort of way. Even the IRS scandal and the VA scandal made many Democrats squirm as well as Republicans, so there was no way to pit one group against the other for political gain. With the immigration surge, however, it is a bit more partisan, and creates a better opportunity for the Democrats to target the Republicans on this issue (and vice versa) — precisely in time for election season.
In fact, the Washington Times noted last week,
“Perhaps one particular decision by the White House highlights how concerned the administration is about public reaction: As of now, not a single illegal-alien detainee seems to have been sent to Louisiana or Arkansas, the states bordering Texas that are closest to the site of the border deluge. This is no accident. Those two states have Democratic senators up for re-election who are vulnerable enough to lose, but who might still be able to prevail. The White House appears to have decided not to send any illegals there to avoid the potential for political damage.”
The White House is keenly aware of not “letting this crisis go to waste”. They have carefully chosen not to send immigrants to states with vulnerable Democrat elections so that they will avoid arousing the Republican/elderly electorate on Election Day.
On the other hand, those who are concerned about the immigrant surge are already being painted as “anti-children”, “heartless”, etc. Those sentiments are certain to be repeated during the election cycle.
At least one group thinks that this crisis is contrived. The National Association of Former Border Patrol Officers (NAFBPO), which issued a statement in early June, essentially stating that surge of immigrants, including minors, crossing our border “is not a humanitarian crisis. It is a predictable, orchestrated and contrived assault on the compassionate side of Americans by her political leaders that knowingly puts minor illegal alien children at risk for purely political purposes.”
The immigration surge is less about immigration than it is about deflection. If the Obama Administration can have a large part of the electorate — especially Republicans and elderly — refocus on something big other than the IRS scandal, VA scandal, and more, then they can be out of scrutiny on those particularly damning issues for at least the time being.
