03-01-04 | News

Bush Proposes Adjusted Illegal Immigrant Work Status

President Bush proposed via a radio address on January 10, 2004, just days before meeting with Mexican President Vicente Fox, a plan to allow about eight million illegal immigrants to work legally in the U.S. for up to three years, basically supplying the manpower for the kinds of work and money most American citizens are not willing to take. Such a policy, he believes, will strengthen the economy.

This adjusted legal status, a proposal that Mr. Fox has been pushing, would allow his citizens to obtain documents to come and go unfettered to work in the U.S.

As we understand it, the illegals who are currently paying Social Security taxes with invalid Social Security numbers, would collect benefits.

As for the mechanics of it, Bush said the programs would “match willing foreign workers with willing American employers, when no Americans can be found to fill the jobs.” How does that work, exactly? Apparently, according to the address, “If an American employer is offering a job that American citizens are not willing to take, we ought to welcome into our country a person who will fill that job.”

Terry Wallace, president of Wallace Landscape Associates in Kennett Square, Pa., Told The News Journal of Delaware that it would make life easier for landscape contractors. His company employs Mexican immigrants under a guest worker program for unskilled agricultural laborers.

The Bush plan is a near replica of a bill introduced in July 2003 by Arizona Republican Reps. Jeff Flake and Jim Kolbe, and Sen. John McCain. There were at last count seven co-sponsors in the House and one in the Senate.

 

Bush Cuts EPA Budget

President released his $2.4 trillion budget for fiscal year 2005 (begins Oct. 1, 2004) Feb. 2, 2004. Bush funded EPA at $7.6 billion, an 8.9 percent cut from FY 2004.

There will be EPA cuts in water management:

$492 million cut in low-interest loans for clean water pollution projects;

$335 million cut in local government grants to improve drinking water and better handle wastewater and stormwater.

There will be increased EPA funding in some areas:

$65 million ($5 million last year) to lower diesel emissions from school buses;

$1.4 billion (9.9 percent more) for pollution cleanups not paid for by the responsible polluters.

Bushes largest increase in funding goes to international assistance, up 36.5 percent from last year to $18.3 billion, more that twice the funding for EPA.

Housing and urban development will be cut by 1.9 percent, down to 34 billion.

There will be no new funding for urban empowerment zones for the third year in a row.

The biggest loser is the small business administration, cut 83.4 percent. Its funding for FY 2005 is only $700 million.

California Employers Launch Workers?EUR??,,????'??? Compensation Action Network

Gov. Schwarzenegger

“We must fix the state’s business climate, and we must start with workers’ compensation reform. California employers are bleeding red ink from the workers’ comp system. Our high costs are driving away jobs and businesses.”

– Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, State of the State Address, January 6, 2004

SACRAMENTO, Calif. – A large group of California associations and employers have formed the Workers’ Compensation Action Network (WCAN), a grassroots effort to pressure the California Legislature to overhaul the state’s costly workers’ compensation system, and soon.

California employers pay far more for workers’ compensation insurance than any other state, according to the WCAN. The Business Wire reports that since 1997, the “total system costs have increased more than 150 percent.”

WCAN participation includes the California Chamber of Commerce (representing 16,000-plus members, 75 percent of which are small employers), the California Landscape Contractors Association, the Associated Builders and Contractors of California, the California Building Industry Association, and about any other association in the state that you can name. There are also over 300 companies on board with the WCAN, including such large institutions as the Bank of America, Boeing, Home Depot, State Farm Insurance, and many more modest concerns.

Editor’s note: The governor asked the legislature to come up with a reform package by March 1. As we go to press, that deadline just passed without being met.

For more information, go to the WCAN website at www.fixworkerscompnow.org.

Labor FACTS

894,000 – number of landscaping and groundskeeping workers in 2000.

1/6 – number of these workers who were self employed.

Source:www.bls.gov