In 2008, Arizona was the first state to go beyond existing Federal laws and impose additional hiring responsibilities and penalties on employers. Some states have since followed, resulting in a state-by-state patchwork of varied enforcement and hiring mechanisms, making the process increasingly difficult, burdensome and costly for employers doing business in multiple states.
Today, the Supreme Court found that the Arizona law falls within the authority Congress has given the states and they have the right to mandate that employers use E-Verify, the Federal verification program and impose certain penalties.
Employers need a reliable, accurate and efficient employment eligibility verification system that also provides fair enforcement of the laws. This includes a consistent system that provides a coherent hiring process across all states. Manufacturers are concerned that this ruling opens the door to additional state action that will make the hiring process more confusing.
Federal preemption of state laws and a safe harbor for employers is necessary to ease the regulatory burden that will continue to be imposed one state at a time.
Joe Trauger is vice president for human resources policy, National Association of Manufacturers.
As a member of Compete America, the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) supports the retention of highly educated, foreign-born talent for the advancement of America’s 21st century workforce. Equally important, the Manufacturers, along with all Compete America members, are dedicated to encouraging the development of “home grown” talent so the United States can compete in the 21st century economy.
Our country is experiencing a deficit of American students and workers in STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) fields. According to the National Science Board’s Science and Engineering Indicators 2010, about five percent of all bachelor’s degrees are in engineering in the United States, compared to 20 percent in Asia and about one-third in China. If we want to compete in the new global economy, a crucial step will be generating more domestic talent for these in-demand careers. We and the members of Compete America are doing something about that. (continue reading…)
(CBS) Job openings at businesses fell to 2.54 million in June from 2.6 million in May, meaning there is now five unemployed workers on average for every job opening.
There’s a brighter spot in manufacturing, where some companies are looking for workers, CBS News Correspondent Cynthia Bowers reports.
On a quick tour of her family’s factory, Linda Fillingham proudly shows off employees making the metal parts that go into some of America’s biggest machines.
What’s holding her machine shop back isn’t a shortage of work. Instead, it’s a shortage of workers, whom she’s willing to pay $13 to $18 an hour.
That’s not to conflate the importance of a skilled workforce with the issue of attracting people with advanced engineering, scientific, programming or mathematical training as noted below.
Sitting here in Washington, one could think the entire nation is obsessively following the health care debate, shouting at the TV for interrupting House whip counts with that stupid March Madness.
But people do have other things on their mind, and you don’t even have to travel to flood-threatened Fårgo to realize that. The corners of 13th and F Street NW are close enough.
The lead headlines in the newspaper boxes indicate differing interests. Yes, health care, but also escalators and Sunday’s pro-immigration march on Washington.
Washington Examiner, “Death by iPod” — It’s dangerous to jog and bike when wearing headphones.
The Express, “Broken Down and Fed Up” — Washington Post’s commuter tabloid highlights Metro’s infuriating escalator breakdowns.
The Spanish-language newspapers have been promoting Sunday’s immigration march on Washington for quite a while, but other D.C.-based media have paid little attention.
National Association of Manufacturers’ President John Engler and Carl Schramm, president and CEO of the Kauffman Foundation, appear on CNBC’s “Street Signs” to discuss jobs creation, with a focus on entrepreneurship, innovation, productivity and the importance of foreign-born employees, education and visas.
Engler: “We are and should be the best country in the world to do research and Development. We ought to be the best country in the world to headquarter our company. We ought to make sure that all our policies align , whether those are tax policies or research and funding of the basic research in this country. Lot of exciting things on the horizon – We ought to be out in front.”
Schramm: “When it comes to creating jobs, it is these new high-tech jobs that actually do lots of on-the-jobs training that intensify the skills-set of our native born population, so in my ways it is a win-win situation to expand our citizenship with folks who are terribly talented. They’ll help us, we’ll help them.”
Schramm and the Kauffman Foundation support what they’re calling an “immigrant’s visa,” described in a Wall Street Journal editorial Tuesday, “Start-up Visas Can Jump-Start the Economy,” by investors Paul Kedrosky and Brad Feld:
In the 21st century … opportunities don’t wait for our interminable, employment-based visa programs. As a result rather than saying “Come and create jobs here” we, in effect, tell them to shove off. Come back when you have a few million in sales— at which point they will be rooted elsewhere and creating jobs somewhere else.
That needs to end now. Immigrants who come here to create companies create jobs. We need the jobs.
One good idea to make this process easier is to create a new visa for entrepreneurs, something that is increasingly being called by venture capitalists, entrepreneurs, and angel investors a “start-up visa.” It might work like this: If immigrant entrepreneurs want to start a company in the U.S. and are able to raise a moderate amount of money (perhaps as little as $125,000) from an accredited U.S.-based venture capital firm or qualified U.S.-based angel investors, we should let them start a company here. It could be a couple of founders with an idea—that’s it. We would give visas to the founders and welcome them in to our country.
One minor error at the start by Erin Burnett: Schramm is attending today’s White House Forum on Jobs and Economic Growth (Kauffman Foundation news release), but the NAM’s Engler is not. Manufacturing is well represented among the 130 attendees, however.
President Bush has ordered federal contractors to participate in the Department of Homeland Security’s electronic system for verifying the immigration status of their workers, greatly expanding the reach of the administration’s crackdown on employers who hire illegal immigrants.
An executive order, signed by the president on Friday and announced on Monday, requires federal contractors to use the system, known as E-Verify, to check immigration status when they hire new workers or start work under government.
South Coast Today (Massachusetts) reports that Eagle Industries, the Missouri-based military equipment manufacturer, will not have to make any changes to comply with the new order.
The ACLU is unhappy, claiming enforcement will encourage more identity theft.
