Imagine a world without labor
certification. For 99.99% of the world
who are enviously ignorant of what labor certification is, the thought experiment
is not difficult. However, for those of
us who know about or work in labor certification it is difficult to imagine the
modern practice of immigration law in the United States without this onerous bureaucratic
gauntlet. For those of you in the lucky
99.99%, labor certification is a process that requires potential immigrants
wishing to enter the US for work to get advanced approval of their work visa by
the Department of Labor.
The Department of Labor (DoL) is much
maligned, but in the field of labor certification, much of that grousing is
warranted. In essence, a labor
certification requires a potential immigrant to prove to the DoL that their
employment in the United States will not “take a job” from a native US worker
and will not negatively impact the local wage scale. Labor certification is a stillborn migration
policy that not only fails in praxis, but makes no sense in theory.
The theory of labor certification is for
the US government to protect domestic workers from foreign competition. Given our modern understanding of foreign
competition, labor certification is a laughable attempt to achieve this goal. In 1965, when the labor certification process
became law, the pressures of globalization and world-wide competition were
quite distinct. Many developing
countries were just barely edging into modernization, telecommunications were mediaeval
compared to modern standards and the world was sliced into ideological blocs
that restricted the movement of everything, from goods and services to ideas
and people. Perhaps, only perhaps, at
that time did labor certification make sense.
Today it is as relevant as typewriter ribbon.
Competition from foreign workers is
everywhere. It fills your local big box store;
it is the basis for your Black Friday sales.
For those of you who remember the “Buy American” campaign, consider
filling your stockings this year with only American-made products. Little Jimmy gets a ratchet set and Molly
gets a handcrafted wooden toy truck that she wants about as much as a
splinter. Check out this site and compare to
what you actually buy and want. The
impact of globalization is obvious. “US
jobs” have been “shipped overseas” for decades now. Detroit, once the epicenter of US
manufacturing and exports, has been downgraded from a city to town or burg or
some sort.
The idea that we can protect US jobs by limiting
immigration is ironically contra factual.
Stemming the tide of more driven people, willing to work more for less,
has possibly kept wages high in this country.
High wages, in turn, drive companies out of the US, taking their tax and
infrastructure benefits with them. In fact, as global production and service
chains expand and technology efficiencies continue to pincer labor, wage competition
among local labor may be one of the only mechanisms that would allow for
adjustments to help the US adapt to the modern globalized economy. Labor
certifications make sure that this market adjustment will never happen.
Finally, with respect to theory, labor
certification is based on insidious nationalist, racist and selfish attitudes
towards production and consumption. The
dialogue is about “our jobs” being “taken.”
This fallacy of entitlement is deeply rooted in human in-group out-group
thinking that has accompanied us out of the jungles and savannahs of our
pre-history. Today the fallacy rings hollow. Consider “US companies” such as Apple
who shift sales and operations around the globe to enjoy tax benefits in
Ireland, for example. Modern global companies
are not national partisans, why then should labor? Jobs today go to the most competitive, in price,
skill or quality. It is no longer
possible to protect a dull and complacent work force. Labor certification is therefore futile.
With regard to the praxis, labor
certification is an exercise in waste.
Because labor certification is required before a visa can be issued, the
whole process must be undertaken before the immigrant arrives in the US. This means waiting for and dealing with an unwieldy
and opaque government bureaucracy from outside the US. The intricacy and layers of requirements to
establish a successful labor certification compel would-be immigrants to use attorneys,
at great expense. Once the labor certificate has been submitted, a government
employee, at public expense, then endeavors to predict if that particular
employment would adversely affect US workers and wages. Given humanity’s
utter inability to predict just about anything, this process borders on the
absurd. What is specifically required
here is the ability to extrapolate from the micro (the individual worker) to
the macro (the economy). Social science
and economic theory are notoriously incompetent with regard to this task. Ultimately, labor certification requires the
staffing of a large government organization tasked with the impossible all in
the name of some goal that lost its relevance some time during the Carter
administration. Simply put, labor
certification is costly and pointless.
Beyond generating employment for bureaucrats and attorneys, the system
serves little purpose and policy makers should consider more dynamic and
real-world solutions to the regulation and management of human migration.
