Throughout the current immigration policy debate, National Public Radio has uncritically reported claims that we need amnesty and massive immigration increases to avert a calamitous labor shortage in the United States.<\/p>\n
Apparently, Yuki Noguchi, NPR\u2019s business correspondent, didn\u2019t get the memo. Reporting on the release of July\u2019s dismal employment data, Noguchi relies on Daniel Alpert, founder of Westwood Capital and a senior fellow at The Century Foundation, to explain why the slight decline in the unemployment rate to 7.4 percent is actually not good news.<\/p>\n
Citing Alpert, Noguchi reports that the key reason for protracted high unemployment and depressed wages is that \u201cthere are essentially too many people looking for work.\u201d Rather than a short-term problem, NPR accepts Alpert\u2019s assessment that this phenomenon is likely to continue. \u201cThe U.S.\u2019s biggest long-term issue: an oversupply of labor,\u201d reports Noguchi.<\/p>\n
NPR\u2019s coverage of the July employment numbers notes that the 162,000 new hires in July is much slower than it has been during the last year. Even more importantly, Noguchi reports that \u201cClose to 60 percent of the jobs created since the beginning of this year are in the lowest third of the pay scale,\u201d and that many of these marginal jobs are part-time, while workers are seeking full-time employment.<\/p>\n
My suggestion: File this report on your computer and next time NPR, or one of its local affiliates reports that we need amnesty and increased immigration to head-off a labor shortage, send them a letter and include a link to their own story. Either we have a labor shortage, or we have an oversupply of labor \u2013 but we can\u2019t have both.