San Diego's stake in the debate over immigration aired

San Diego's stake in the debate over immigration aired

By Diane Lindquist
STAFF WRITER
San Deigo Union Tribune

June 15, 2006

San Diego's location on the border and its large pool of undocumented workers give it a major stake in the current immigration debate, political, academic and business leaders from both sides of the border said yesterday.

Unauthorized workers make up as much as a tenth of San Diego's work force, said San Diego State University economist James Gerber. Their labor has helped sustain the growth of the area's housing and service economies.

(snip)

The panelists offered little hope that Congress will produce legislation that will adequately address illegal immigration. Some doubted any law could be passed... The controversy surrounding the issue stems from the failure of President Bush and Mexican President Vicente Fox to handle the problem five years ago, said Jeffrey Davidow, a former U.S ambassador to Mexico who now heads the Institute of the Americas at UCSD. “The conventional wisdom is that 9/11 put a halt to any kind of immigration reform. The fact is . . . the (Bush) administration decided it was a topic too hot to handle,” he said. In Mexico, Davidow said, the response was not an understanding of the politics but an insistence on a whole-or-nothing approach. As a result, he said, the problem has grown and generated “bitterness, opposition to migrants and a certain amount of racism.”

Fringe groups have captured the issue, there's been an increase in nativist attitudes, migrants have not seen their lives improve, and national security has not been enhanced, Davidow said.

(snip)

The country needs not only to provide jobs for its working population, but it must also provide jobs that pay high enough salaries to erase the current wage gap in which Mexican jobs pay one-eighth of what is offered in the United States.

(snip)


Find this article at:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20060615/news_1b15immig.html