Immigration Laws: February, 2002 - Number #5

The US unemployment rate rose to 5.8 percent in December 2001, the highest level in six years. As the unemployment rate rose, the social safety net came under pressure. Most of the programs that provide benefits to unemployed or injured workers are operated by states, which are free to set rules within federal guidelines. One such program is unemployment insurance, begun in 1935 to provide weekly benefits to workers who were laid off. However, only about 40 percent of unemployed US workers receive UI benefits, down from 55 percent in the 1950s.

During the 1990s boom, many states reduced the taxes that employers pay to finance UI benefits and tightened eligibility requirements to keep their UI systems solvent, so many unemployed workers find that they cannot get UI benefits, or that UI benefits are very low. UI benefits average 35 percent of previous earnings, an average $230 a week or $12,000 a year across the US. Most states argue that unemployment insurance is intended to help people with a small amount of money in their search for a new job, not to replace lost wages.

A January 2002 poll, A Workplace Divided: How Americans View Discrimination and Race on the Job, found that there was more diversity among large than small US employers. In workplaces with 250 or more employees, eight percent of white workers had no African-American co-workers and 15 percent no Hispanic co-workers. In workplaces with fewer than 25 employees, 64 percent of white workers had no African-American co-workers, and 60 percent no Hispanic co-workers.

Maids. A Saudi princess was arrested in Orlando in December 2001, accused of pushing her $200 a month Indonesian maid down a flight of stairs. The princess claimed she had diplomatic immunity, but she does not. Orlando is the No. 1 destination in the United States for Saudi tourists, with the area's amusement parks providing safe and highly organized recreation.

In another case, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in January 2002 that an illiterate, Portuguese-speaking Brazilian woman who was abused and kept in servitude for nearly 20 years by a Gaithersburg, Maryland couple is entitled to 14 years of back pay. The woman had been brought into the US to be a maid for a Brazilian couple.

H-1B. In fiscal 2001, 48 percent of all H-1B applications were approved, 163,000 of 342,035, compared with a 38 percent approval rate for 294,000 H-1B applications in fiscal 2000. H-1B workers requested by universities, government agencies and non-profit groups are exempt from the 195,000 annual ceiling.

California. California plans a new Cabinet-level Labor and Workforce Development Agency that would include the Economic Development Department, the Department of Industrial Relations, the Agricultural Labor Relations Board and the Workforce Investment Board. Labor and employment issues are currently dealt with under 34 different programs in 13 different agencies that spend $4.6 billion a year.

The new agency is expected to improve coordination to enforce labor laws, and eventually, plans call for the Industrial Relations Department to run all apprenticeship programs while California Community Colleges handle vocational and adult education programs.

California may become the first state to set minimum staffing levels for nurses. After regulatory review, the state would set a ratio of the number of nurses needed to care for a given number of patients, for instance, at least one nurse for four emergency room patients. In general medical and surgical wards, there will eventually be a minimum of five patients for each nurse.

The hospital industry said the new rules would be a financial burden and could actually hurt patient care because of a severe nurse shortage in the state. Regulators say that an additional 5,000 nurses are needed to satisfy the new ratios; California graduates about 5,000 trained nurses a year.

Unions. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that 16.3 million wage and salary workers were members of unions in 2001, unchanged from 2000. About 13 percent of wage and salary workers were union members, down from 20 percent in 1983. Blacks were more likely to be union members, at 17 percent, than whites (13 percent) or Hispanics (11 percent). The AFL-CIO is a federation of 64 unions with a combined 13 million members.

Supreme Court/NLRB. The US Supreme Court heard arguments in January 2002 in a case in which a Mexican national presented false documents to get a job at a California plant, and then was fired after trying to start a union. The National Labor Relations Board ordered Hoffman Plastic Compounds to pay Jose Castro $67,000. Hoffman appealed; a decision is expected before June 2002.

Many employers require new hires to sign agreements promising to arbitrate "any dispute or claim" involving his job. In a 6-3 decision in January 2002, the US Supreme Court ruled that, even if a worker signs such an arbitration agreement, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission may sue the employer for unlawful discrimination. However the EEOC intervenes in fewer than one percent of the job bias cases filed each year by workers. In 2000, 79,896 complaints of employment discrimination were filed, but only 402 resulted in lawsuits against employers by the EEOC (EEOC vs. Waffle House, 99-1823).

Welfare. The $17 billion food stamp program, which is 100 percent federally funded, has been off-limits to most immigrants who arrived after 1996, unless they have worked in the US for 10 years, were in the military, were recent refugees or had sought asylum. Some 18.4 million US residents received Food Stamps in October 2001. Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX) captured the majority view in 1996 when he said, "Immigrants should come to the U.S. with their sleeves rolled up, ready to work, not with their hands out, ready to go on welfare."

About 800,000 immigrants were removed from Food Stamp rolls in 1996. In 1998, access to Food Stamp benefits was restored to some 175,000 immigrants, mostly children and older people who were in the US before August 1996.

The Bush administration is proposing that legal immigrants who have lived--but not necessarily worked --in the United States for five years may obtain Food Stamps, a change that is projected to add 363,000 people to the food stamp rolls by 2006 and cost $2.1 billion over 10 years. Food Stamps are available to people with gross incomes up to 130 percent of the poverty level, or up to $1,585 a month for a three-person household.

The 55-member House Immigration Reform Caucus says it will oppose restoring Food Stamp benefits. Caucus Chairman Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-CO) said that Bush was pandering to Hispanics for votes: he said: "Votes can't be bought with welfare."

Many states have 100 percent state-funded programs that provide benefits to immigrants ineligible for federal benefits. For example, California has a Cash Assistance Program for Immigrants (CAPI) and a California Food Assistance Program (CFAP).

The major provisions of the 1996 welfare reform expire September 30, 2002, unless they are reauthorized by Congress. Between 1996 and 2001, the number of recipients of cash aid fell from 12.2 million to 5.3 million, and the percentage of children in poverty fell from 20.5 to 16.2 percent. Some Congressional Democrats want to maintain time limits on cash assistance, but increase payments to states that reduce the percentage of children in poverty.

Federal grants to the states for public assistance, known as Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, were $16.5 billion in 2001,the amount the federal government was spending on welfare before 1996. With welfare rolls down, average spending for each recipient has increased, with a larger share of the money is being used for transportation and other services to help welfare recipients climb the job ladder.

Congressional Democrats are proposing that the federal government provide $18.7 billion a year to states, that participation in training and education programs could count as "work" for two years, up from the current one year, and that each month in which a welfare recipient had earnings would not be counted against the five-year limit for cash assistance.