Tories create second-class worker category
This should get more press than it is: the Harper Tories have passed a new law saying foreign temp workers can be paid less than the “prevailing wage”, a decision that till now their immigration minister has rejected.
Raoul 07:31 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
great, instead of screwing illegals on the black market you can screw temps legally. And im the same breath they ask why unemployed persons dont take these jobs. With measures like these coming into play, it should be pretty obvious there is less money in some of those jobs than there is on EI or welfare. Lets face it the only reason they are temp is because the govt doesnt want them claiming more benefits then what they earned in those shitty jobs.
Kate 09:13 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
I assumed they’re temporary jobs because the people doing them aren’t landed immigrants – they’re brought here for the contract and are supposed to go home at the end of it. The phenomenon’s most familiar in Quebec with the Mexicans who come here to do the harvest, but with this new law we’ll see a lot more of it. Employers love this kind of thing – they get their work done cheap, but don’t have any payroll taxes or commitment to their workers, it’s like being rolled back to the 1890s.
I would have to say, about this: where are the big unions? They should be outraged about it. Workers are workers, regardless of where they come from and their citizenship status. Because people are poor and are willing to put up with crap should not devalue their humanity.
Adam 09:13 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Let me get this straight: the government is making it easier for foreigners to get a job here, and your objection is that it’s bad for the foreigners? If it’s such a bad deal, don’t worry: none of them will take the work. If they take the work, it’s because they think that it’s the best available option. Would you prefer the government not have created this new class of visa?
Yes, it would be better to just have open borders, period, but it’s not going to happen and any step that lets people come here to find a better life is an improvement. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Adam 09:14 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Kate, what planet do you live on? You seem to think that the alternative to these jobs are high-paying jobs. It’s not: the alternative is NO jobs. Unskilled workers are not going to get a high wage because no one is going to pay them $20/hr for labour that is only worth less than half of that. That’s just economics 101.
Adam 09:15 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
And incidentally, unions are certainly going to be against it because unions as a general rule HATE immigration. They want to keep the labour supply as limited as possible, and that means keeping the greasy foreigners out.
Kate 09:25 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Adam, if people living here are undercut by temp workers who work for less and with no benefits, those people will be pushed to work (legally or illegally) for lower money and fewer or no benefits. The bottom is already out of our labour situation illegally – I have seen this with my own eyes, I’m not making it up – and the Tories, instead of sticking up for people who have clawed their way into Canada and are trying to make ends meet, has just officially cut them loose to fend for themselves. No, I am not happy about it. I live on this planet and I feel more for the people at the low end, not for the employers.
Adam 10:24 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Yes, obviously supply increases, prices fall. Again, economics 101. In other words, what you’re saying is that we should keep out foreigners to restrict the labour supply. And if that condemns them to a miserable subsistence existence in their own countries instead of trying to make a better life for themselves here, well, that’s not your problem. Out of sight of of mind?
Keep telling yourself that this is about Big, Bad employers if it makes you feel better, but the truth is that it’s about poor people in poor countries and whether they’re entitled to the same opportunities to improve their lives as the rest of us.
Kate 11:16 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Are you happy with pure social darwinism, where when “supply” increases, some should be allowed to starve while others prosper? If so, your position makes logical sense.
It costs more to live in our climate than in the south. That alone is a factor that works against this two-tier plan, and against making people established in Canada “compete” with workers from the south.
Adam 11:36 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Kate, the scenario you’re describing is exactly what is happening now. The people who are suffering just happen to be suffering outside of Canada. Are you saying that since it’s happening abroad, it doesn’t count?
No one has the right to protect his or her standard of living by forbidding other human beings from competing against them. It’s obscenely immoral.
For crying out loud, you are literally arguing that poor people should keep suffering “over there” instead of coming here to seek a better life. Are you really comfortable with that position?
Kate 12:00 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
If it’s happening abroad we can’t do anything about it. We can do something to make sure people here are not treated shabbily – whether they’re established here as immigrants or not. If we’ve admitted people as immigrants and citizens, it means we’ve made some kind of commitment to them, and yes, as things stand, with nation states and borders, they should get priority in our concerns, without making that mean treating other people like crap.
Of course we have the right to protect our standard of living, to fight for reasonable payment for work, for health care, for safe clean places to live. I’d even say we have the duty to fight for better lives, because history shows we don’t get what we don’t fight for, and the minute we give up the struggle, things start being taken away from us.
Robert H 12:06 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Adam, of course Kate isn’t arguing that foreign workers should suffer. She doesn’t think that millions of struggling Canadians should have to give up hard-won gains to make it easier for certain employers to exploit foreign workers. The borderless world you claim won’t happen will quickly arrive with laws like this: we will have a majority prole class made up of people resigned to eking out a life-long living in low-paying work. The race to the bottom drags down everybody till we all might as well be living in China, Russia, or Uzbekistan. Since you don’t seem to mind people who have little to begin with doing with less, ask yourself what YOU are willing to give up. You make a sin out of aspiration.
mdblog 12:18 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Adam, your logic is confounding. I imagine that if Kate argued that we should be fighting against the suffering of people throughout the world (which she is not) you would claim that this is uneconomic and senseless.
Canada has a proud tradition of integrating and helping immigrants going all the way back to the natives helping the Europeans (the French) survive here when they first arrived. It’s one of the core values of our country and one that I applaud Kate for standing up for.
Adam 13:05 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
“If it’s happening abroad we can’t do anything about it.”
Yes, we can. We can let them come here and enjoy the same opportunities as the rest of us.
“ask yourself what YOU are willing to give up”
Let foreign workers compete with me. I’m up to the challenge.
“You make a sin out of aspiration.”
You mean the aspiration of people who are willing to give up their lives and all that they know for a new country in the hopes of having something better for themselves and their children? That aspiration? Because that’s the one that you seem to have a problem with and that I’m in favour of nurturing.
“easier for certain employers to exploit foreign workers”
Please put this repulsive canad to bed. Foreign workers come here because they want to experience what you call “exploitation” – in other words, a job.
You people are tying yourselves into knots to avoid facing the fact that at the heart of what you are advocating is closing borders to poor people from poor countries so that they can’t strive for a better future. It’s appalling. I wonder if you’d make the same argument to their faces: “Sorry, but you’re just going to have to stay here and continue to be stuck in poverty while I enjoy my Western lifestyle back in Canada. Anyways, good luck!”
Kate 13:51 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
We can let them come here and enjoy the same opportunities as the rest of us.
But that’s precisely what we’re not doing. We’re bringing them here to do work more cheaply than we do, and shipping them home when we no longer “need” them. If you think all workers should be treated that way, then I guess it’s OK by you. It isn’t by me.
I have never, ever said we should close our borders, so please stop it with that straw man you’re punching. Many people immigrate to Canada every year and, once here, need to be treated like the rest of us. The Tories are making it harder to get into Canada, and although the details of this new plan are not clear, it wouldn’t surprise me if part of the deal is that they agree not to become refugees or otherwise make a bid to stay permanently. But I admit I’m just guessing this is how it may work.
However we slice it, creating a class of second-class citizens is a very bad trend, both for the people being treated like commodities, and for people here who struggled to come here (borrowing some of your overemotional rhetoric) hoping to be treated better than this.
Adam 14:48 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Kate, the question here is simple: are you in favour of allowing more unskilled workers into this country or not? If you are, then it shouldn’t matter that it’s a crappy program that only allows them in temporarily. It’s something, and it’s better than nothing. The perfect should not be the enemy of the good. Conversely, if you are upset that this program is likely to depress wages (which it will, if foreigners take advantage of it), then the logical implication of that belief is that we should *not* allow unskilled workers to immigrate here. How could you possibly simultaneously oppose this program because it will depress wages *and* support generally relaxing restrictions on unskilled worker immigration? That would depress wages even more.
I know that you don’t mean to argue that we should close the borders, but it’s the obvious conclusion of the argument that a greater supply of labour is bad because it pushes wages down. Unless you would argue that we should only allow rich, skilled workers into Canada, which I doubt you would.
Yeah, I don’t want a second class of visa, either. Yeah, who the hell knows what Harper’s motives are. But since realistically, the alternative isn’t free migration but rather no program of this kind at all and (as you say) just making it harder to get into Canada, it’s better than nothing and I’ll give the government half a cheer for implementing it.
Adam 14:55 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
“If you think all workers should be treated that way, then I guess it’s OK by you. It isn’t by me.”
And just to be clear, this program would do nothing but make a new option available to foreigners. It’s not as good an option as it might otherwise be, but no one is going to take it unless they think it’s the best alternative they have. So giving them a lousy option is better than nothing. Again, something is better than nothing.
qatzelok 15:15 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Adam’s corporatist benevolence (`lots of good jobs for all the poor foreigners’) ignores the role that Canadian corporations play in keeping other nations poor through military attack and collusion with large financiers. Most of those ‘poor foreigners’ would be happier back in their native country, if Canadian corporatists would just stop bombing them and bankrupting them via our dictators.
Adam 15:44 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
qatzelok gets the prize for non-sequitur of the day. Seriously, is changing the subject to imply that I believe random things that are totally unrelated the best you can do? Did I say something that sounded like I was pro-war? Do you think it might be possible to be both pro-peace *and* pro-open borders? If we stop the war and open the borders, even better.
And, “corporatist benevolence” indeed. Now apparently being in favour of making it easier for poor foreigners to get jobs is corporatism. I guess I should be grateful that I’m the victim of such corporatist exploitation (also called a job).
mdblog 15:58 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Adam, go get a drink, take a valium, smoke a joint; whatever you need to do to calm down and think some of this out. It may sound crazy, but you may not be as infallible on this issue as you think.
Adam 16:55 on 2012/04/30 Permalink
Sorry mdblog, but I get worked up about this kind of thing. At least when conservatives argue for keeping people out, they will admit that they just don’t like foreigners. That’s the kind of intellectual consistency I can get behind, in a sad way.
David Tighe 07:56 on 2012/05/01 Permalink
Reducing the wages of foreign workers by 15% is a very retrograde step. The logic behind it is to drive down wages for the lowest paid workers. The main effect will be to bring down the “prevailing wage” as employers maximise use of cheaper labour. It is I agree astonishing that the unions do not complain but I think that unions have long ceased to defend other than pockets of highly paid and protected workers.