This immigration issue (needs to be understood by looking at the demographic changes in our population.) During the industrial revolution, American workers flocked from rural farms and small towns into jobs in industry. During the Great Depression, there were vast armies of the unemployed on the road and hopping trains to places where they believed work could be found. These Americans were like the immigrants now, in the sense that they had limited educations and were experiencing hunger; so were willing to take whatever jobs they could find to put the bacon and beans on the table. After WWII, the GI Bill made possible a free education for veterans and created a very large middle class. These folks and their children had aspirations beyond low-paying, physically demanding jobs to which they earlier would have been relegated. 

Nowadays there are few Americans left in the small towns (many of which are dying) and on the farms (many of which are run by agribusiness and already employ immigrants) to fill these bottom-rung jobs, but the need for workers to fill them has only increased exponentially. There is poverty in the American ghettos and in our homeless population, but these folks are, in a sense, trapped there due to psychological and other factors. Immigrants, however, feel lucky to get their low-paying, arduous jobs. They fill a need in our economy. They contribute, in fact, to the economy. Their children are learning English and getting an education. So, what exactly is the problem?

Contact Maria Wilson

[Ed: Letter published in the AJC, August 16, 2006]