Dey Turk Er Jerbs, or Why We Should Legalize Immigration

As everyone knows, a super common talking point on the right is how undocumented immigrants are stealing jobs from citizens of the US. The common leftist rebuttal is that those jobs that are taken tend to be jobs which Americans tend not to want to work anyways such as difficult farm labor. But what makes anyone think that Americans wouldn’t want those jobs? Maybe they’d fight harder for better conditions since they have more legal protections to do so but they certainly would be willing to work in those industries. After all, many Americans do in fact work in farming, landscaping, meatpacking, constructions, restaurants, and many other fields that undocumented immigrants also work in. Maybe not for the same bosses or even the same companies, but equivalent positions to be sure. So why are undocumented immigrants hired for these jobs over American workers?

Because undocumented workers are willing to work for less and are unable to report workplace abuse or exploitation without themselves risking arrest and deportation. In a sense, they are the perfect capitalist worker, able to be treated barely better than slaves with no real threat of retaliation. They are so perfect in this role that we see many companies actively advertise in Mexico to encourage undocumented immigrants to come here for jobs. But while this is a situation that capitalists help create, immigrants get the blame and border security becomes a major concern.

But a closed border is exactly what perpetuates these issues.

As contrary as it may seem initially, opening up the border more will actually solve these issues. The only reason undocumented immigrants are able to be hired for less than minimum wage and under such terrible working conditions is because they are undocumented. Tightening border security has done little to actually stop people from immigrating illegally, only making it more difficult and dangerous. If anything, it has only serves to create more undocumented immigrants as the legal means for immigration become more difficult to navigate, incentivizing people to cross illegally, and since anyone who does successfully cross the border illegally is far less likely to risk crossing back afterwards. They choose to immigrate illegally because, despite how horrifyingly dangerous it is to do so, it is still easier for many than immigrating legally. Not to mention, a majority of undocumented immigrants cross legally to begin with and then merely overstay their visas, something that border security has absolutely no means to deal with since these folks have already long crossed.

So in order to solve the problem, we have to reverse the incentives and make it easier and more appealing to immigrate legally. If we further opened the border and allowed for easier legal immigration, it would cut down on the amount of illegal immigration. This means far less undocumented immigrants and far more documented immigrants. Documented immigrants cannot be exploited by capitalists in the same way since they have legal protections and can report their bosses without fear of arrest or deportation. Since bosses can’t hire them for less than legal wages and can’t work them under less than legal conditions without risking their documented employees seeking legal recourse, they have no incentive to hire them over US-born workers. Instead of immigrants “stealing jobs” and driving down wages, this puts immigrants and US-born workers on a more equal playing field in terms of job acquisition and wages. This means that companies will have to hire based on skill rather than who is more able to be exploited. This gives US-born workers more of a fighting chance while also getting rid of, or at least scaling back, the systems that oppress immigrants as well.

So next time someone tells you that immigrants are stealing our jobs, don’t try to argue with them and convince them that they aren’t, but rather agree with them and explain that it is for that very reason that we should further open the borders (and maybe abolish ICE too).

The Center for a Stateless Society (www.c4ss.org) is a media center working to build awareness of the market anarchist alternative