Immigration Controls. Who Benefits?

 

A positive message about Canada's immigration that is worth quoting.

"There are basically two ways to respond to immigration... accuse immigrants of taking jobs, housing, and social services away from White Canadians. These racist messages are openly promoted by... the mainstream People’s Party of Canada that campaigns to “Substantially lower the total number of immigrants and refugees” because (they claim) immigrants “cost Canadian taxpayers billions of dollars” and undermine “Canadian values.”

The socialist response to immigration is based on working-class solidarity: the belief that an injury to one is an injury to all and that the best way to raise our living standards is for all workers to stand together against the employer class...

...For hundreds of thousands of years, there were no human obstacles to migration, and people travelled freely from our origins in Africa to populate every corner of the globe. The freedom to travel ended with the emergence of private property, no-trespassing laws, and the rise of nation states.

Nation states are defined by policed borders and by the nationalist myth that people on one side of the border share a common identity and values that are not shared by people on the other side. This is nonsense. Borders are arbitrarily drawn and redrawn...

...We are indoctrinated in nationalism from childhood. ..This practice accustoms us to embrace the interests of our rulers as our interests, and their goals as our goals. The myth of a united nation binds workers to their rulers and, in the process, divides them from their own class, including migrant workers in their own communities who are stigmatized as ‘them,’ not ‘us.’...Nationalism is inherently racist because it distinguishes who is and is not worthy of entry to the nation...

All wealthier nations, including Canada, have a birth rate below replacement level, meaning not enough babies are born to replace those who die. Canada also has an aging population. Since 2001, the number of people over age 85 has doubled. Presently, immigration accounts for more than 80 percent of Canada’s population growth and almost 100 percent of its labour force growth. This has not been enough, and the business class is calling for more migrant labor.

The COVID pandemic caused more than 44,000 deaths in Canada, disabled many thousands more, pulled people out of work to care for the sick and disabled, and prompted a record number of older workers to retire early. This past June, unemployment hit its lowest level in 50 years. Statistics Canada reports over one million unfilled jobs across all provinces and sectors, especially in health care, construction, accommodation, food, retail, and manufacturing...

It’s not as though everyone seeking a job can have one. There are a million unemployed workers in Canada because the wages being offered in many sectors are lower than most workers will accept. People need more. Compared with last year, nearly twice as many workers left lower-paid jobs for higher-paid ones. This has increased the number of unfilled low-waged jobs.

Because of the shortage of workers or, more accurately, the shortage of wages, existing workers are being forced to work extra shifts and extended hours that increase workplace stress, injuries, and deaths. When workers at one scaffolding company refused to work regular overtime, the company threatened to fire them and have them jailed for engaging in an illegal strike. When workers are difficult to attract, employers are forced to compete for them. Some fast-food outlets are offering $17 an hour to start. Other companies are offering thousands of dollars in sign-on bonuses. While offering higher pay does attract workers, it cuts into profits. It also gives workers confidence to push for more.

Governments fear that existing conditions could lead to a wage explosion, so they are raising interest rates to slow the economy, increase unemployment, and dampen workers’ demands.

They also plan to import more low-waged workers with fewer rights to resist substandard conditions. Canada’s immigration system provides this kind of labor by offering mostly temporary and conditional permits that tie workers to a single employer. When temporary and conditional permits inevitably expire, they are difficult to renew because the application process is complicated, and the system is seriously backlogged, with more than 1.5 million applications for study permits, work permits, temporary visas, and visitor extensions waiting to be reviewed. Until their applications are approved, which can take years or even decades, migrants without documents have no legal rights or protections, no access to social services or medical care, and must work for cash under the table. Currently half-a-million people in Canada are undocumented, mostly because of expired permits. They live in poverty, and the threat of deportation makes them vulnerable to wage theft, sexual assault, and other abuses...

There are plenty of workers willing to migrate. Many are desperate to leave homelands ravaged by colonialism, war, poverty, and climate change. Wealthy nations use these migrants to regulate their own labor force. They open their borders to migrant workers when they need more or cheaper labor, and close them when they don’t. A global migration industry has developed to exploit this situation...

anada produces more than enough cookies for everyone. Last year, workers in this country produced $3 trillion worth of goods and services. That’s two-and-a-half times more than we produced 20 years ago. Our wages haven’t gone up two-and-a-half times. On the contrary, wages have stagnated or fallen in real terms. That’s because employers took all the cookies, leaving workers to fight over the crumbs: low wages; threadbare social supports; back-breaking, soul-killing work; and a falling standard of living.

Are bosses taking too much, so there’s not enough for the rest of us? Or are there too many of us, and not enough to go around, so we need to reduce our numbers? This second explanation is based on the myth of scarcity. For over 200 years, the belief that there are too many needy people has been used to justify social inequality and working-class deprivation. Consider the lack of affordable housing. Most people living in large Canadian cities cannot afford the cost of rent. In the US, a full-time minimum-wage worker cannot afford rent in ANY state. Is the problem too many people, not enough housing, or wages too low to access what housing is available? There are millions of vacant homes in the world, including over a million in Canada...

If we think the problem is too many people chasing not enough goods, then we should close the door to immigrants. If we think the problem is rich people hoarding the wealth, the food, and everything else, then we should change society to ensure that what we produce meets people’s needs...

We were lied to and robbed! The benefit of rising productivity went exclusively to the employers, who got richer and more powerful as trillions of dollars were transferred from workers to bosses. During the first two years of the pandemic alone, the world’s 10 richest men more than doubled their fortunes. Today, just 10 individuals command more wealth than the annual value of all goods and services produced by most nations. That is truly mind-boggling! The reason why most people today work so hard and so long for so little has nothing to do with immigrants. We are victims of grand theft capitalism...We were lied to and robbed! The benefit of rising productivity went exclusively to the employers, who got richer and more powerful as trillions of dollars were transferred from workers to bosses.

During the first two years of the pandemic alone, the world’s 10 richest men more than doubled their fortunes. Today, just 10 individuals command more wealth than the annual value of all goods and services produced by most nations. That is truly mind-boggling! The reason why most people today work so hard and so long for so little has nothing to do with immigrants. We are victims of grand theft capitalism...

While the capitalist class want more migrant labor, they oppose giving them permanent resident status because precarious labor is more profitable, and dividing workers makes them easier to manage...we must build a united, anti-racist workers’ movement that replaces nationalist barriers with the invitation, “You are welcome here!”...

The full unabridged article can be read here

Immigration: Who Benefits? Who Suffers? - Susan Rosenthal