General Discussion
Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsForeign workers, why are so many here? Everywhere I go at the beach
there are foreign workers. Even the most remote fruit stand in NC has foreign workers. I had a discussion with a friend and I was thinking it's because they don't have to be paid as much but she said they all have to make minimum wage. Is that correct? I googled and the info i found was inconclusive as some visas are different. Does anyone have any good info on this topic?
markiv
(1,489 posts)many citizens having to train their own replacement before being fired
Violet_Crumble
(35,961 posts)rainy
(6,090 posts)There have been stories about this beach town and foreign workers and I see it. It's different than 10 years ago when all the local high-school kids worked the summer jobs here.
muriel_volestrangler
(101,306 posts)Who knew?
On the bright side, this means the USA could chuck Kissinger out ...
bettyellen
(47,209 posts)kids came over to work for the summer in bars and restaurants. They explained there was an agency that facilitated that kind of thing there for years. I have heard of others, for Russians and East Europeans down the Jersey Shore. It just takes people who know the process and have a connect on the other side. I think the major advantage is, they aren't going to go anywhere when you have helped them with transportation and housing too. FWIW, I have always seen a mix in Jersey.
HipChick
(25,485 posts)Non-white?
Foreign is persons with a foreign accent. Lots of kids from Eastern Europe and in the last few years Ireland.
My guess as to why is that employers consider them more reliable. They really need the money and will show up everyday. They also won't quit halfway through the season because they are bored or met a boy/girl they want to spend more time with. That is what I was told by some businesses a few years back; these days there may be more local kids that are willing to work for the summer but with the ways many schools start in August there is still the attrition problem.
rainy
(6,090 posts)can have workers.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)So I wouldn't be quick to judge racism ...until I saw them answer what clued them in.
In many parts of the country who don't have as many influxes of new immigrants ...it might seem out of place to hear an accent and not some kind of prejudice going on.
But, then I don't know what the poster was talking about...but, just trying to say we shouldn't jump all over them.
BTW: Foreign Workers being abused in Beach/Resort Communties up and down the East Coast were a problem. NYT did a big EXPOSE on it a few years back...but, I've not seen much since. They were promising workers from Eastern European Countries "Summer Internships" and once they got here they were sent to some place in Coast where they worked in Restaurants for almost no money and were housed in really disgusting housing.
Just saying...
Violet_Crumble
(35,961 posts)And I'm taking a wild guess that there'd be Americans who don't have American accents. I'm thinking the beach isn't the best example to use when talking about foreign workers.
rainy
(6,090 posts)rainy
(6,090 posts)in the hotels, everywhere.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)servers were mostly Eastern European with accents. We asked our server where she was from and she didn't want to reply.
But, as I said in post above...there are people on the East Coast who are making money off of Young People from other countries, promising them Educational Opportunites and Internships and they they ship them into towns give them low paying jobs in Restaurants and sub-standard housing.
When I grew up it used to be College Kids could get those Jobs in Resort/Beach Communities and the housing was not substandard and the kids loved it and so did the patrons who knew they were giving these students Summer Employment. We used to tip heavily...because the kids were so great to talk to...plus they took their job seriously.
But..that has changed in the last 15 or more years..
rainy
(6,090 posts)evidence of it on the net.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)Here's one article where AP tried to call out the abuse. It didn't go far...though. This is from 2004.
----------------
J-1 Student Visa Abuse: Foreign Students Forced To Work In Strip Clubs, Eat On Floor
HOLBROOK MOHR, MITCH WEISS and MIKE BAKER 12/ 6/10 04:18 PM ET
MYRTLE BEACH, S.C. Lured by unsupervised, third-party brokers with promises of steady jobs and a chance to sightsee, some foreign college students on summer work programs in the U.S. get a far different taste of life in America.
An Associated Press investigation found students forced to work in strip clubs instead of restaurants. Others take home $1 an hour or even less. Some live in apartments so crowded that they sleep in shifts because there aren't enough beds. Others have to eat on floors.
They are among more than 100,000 college students who come to the U.S. each year on popular J-1 visas, which supply resorts with cheap seasonal labor as part of a program aimed at fostering cultural understanding.
Government auditors have warned about problems in the program for 20 years, but the State Department, which is in charge of it, only now says it is working on new rules. Officials won't say what those rules are or discuss on the record the problems that have plagued J-1 visas.
John Woods, deputy assistant director of national security for Immigrations and Customs Enforcement, told the AP there were at least two federal investigations under way into human trafficking related to J-1 visas. He would not provide details.
The AP interviewed students, advocates, local authorities and social service agencies, and reviewed thousands of pages of confidential records, police reports and court cases. Among the findings:
_ Many foreign students pay recruiters to help find employment, then don't get work or wind up making little or no money at menial jobs. Labor recruiters charge students exorbitant rent for packing them into filthy, sparsely furnished apartments so crowded that some endure "hotbunking," where they sleep in shifts.
Students routinely get threatened with deportation or eviction if they quit, or even if they just complain too loudly. Some resort to stealing essentials like food, toothpaste and underwear, according to police.
"The vast majority of participating students in this program find it a rewarding experience and return home safely," the State Department said in an e-mail to the AP.
But it's not hard to find exceptions. Most of the nearly 70 students the AP interviewed in 10 states, hailing from 16 countries, said they were disappointed, and some were angry.
"This is not what I thought when I paid all this money to come here," said Natalia Berlinschi, a Romanian who came to the U.S. on a J-1 visa hoping to save up for dental school but got stuck in South Carolina this summer without a job. She took to begging for work on the Myrtle Beach boardwalk and sharing a three-bedroom house with 30 other exchange students.
"I was treated very, very badly," Berlinschi said. "I will never come back."
_ The State Department failed to even keep up with the number of student complaints until this year, and has consistently shifted responsibility for policing the program to the 50 or so companies that sponsor students for fees that can run up to several thousand dollars. That has left businesses to monitor their own treatment of participants.
The program generates millions for the sponsor companies and third-party labor recruiters.
Businesses that hire students can save 8 percent by using a foreign worker over an American because they don't have to pay Medicare, Social Security and unemployment taxes. The students are required to have health insurance before they arrive, another cost that employers don't have to bear.
Many businesses say they need the seasonal work force to meet the demand of tourist season.
"There's been a massive failure on the part of the United States to bring any accountability to the temporary work visa programs, and it's especially true for the J-1," said Terry Coonan, a former prosecutor and the executive director of Florida State University's Center for the Advancement of Human Rights.
The issues are serious enough that the former Soviet republic of Belarus told its young people in 2006 to avoid going to the U.S. on a J-1, warning of a "high level of danger" after one of its citizens in the program was murdered, another died in what investigators in the U.S. said was a suicide, and a third was robbed.
_ Strip clubs and adult entertainment companies openly solicit J-1 workers, even though government regulations ban students from taking jobs "that might bring the Department of State into notoriety or disrepute."
"If you wish to dance in USA as a J-1 exchange visitor, contact us," ZM Studios, a broker for topless dancers, advertised on its website this year. The ad said ZM Studios is "affiliated with designated visa sponsors" and can get women J-1 visas and jobs at topless clubs in cities like Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
MUCH MORE OF ARTICLE AT:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/06/j1-student-visa-abuse-for_n_792354.html
rainy
(6,090 posts)Yo_Mama
(8,303 posts)Here's an article from the NY Times. Yes, they are being used to replace the summer jobs college students used to get, and if you analyze what's really going on, they get low wages.
Because the economy in Europe is so bad, it's relatively easy for them to get students to sign up, and the program keeps growing.
Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)rainy
(6,090 posts)Blue_Tires
(55,445 posts)But for whatever reasons (complaints, corruption, low wages, whatever) I've seen a lot less Eastern European employees working there the past couple of summers...Back when that piece was written, like 3 out of 4 cashiers/waitresses/parking lot attendants, etc. were clearly Polish/Czech/Russian....
(and yes, at least as far as the women were concerned, I never met one of them who wasn't incredibly attractive)
Fawke Em
(11,366 posts)Gatlinburg, Pigeon Forge and Sevierville - all near the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.
We go there a few times a year to take the kids to Dollywood.
When were eating at a nearby restaurant, I noticed several of the servers were Russian (husband speaks Russian, so we noticed it right away).
For some reason, that made me laugh. It just seems that Pigeon Forge is far less exotic than wherever these beautiful, white and Russian-speaking servers were from.
Spider Jerusalem
(21,786 posts)I walk past a 700-year-old castle almost every day; it doesn't seem exotic because I live here. "Exotic" depends on what you're used to.
Purrfessor
(1,188 posts)Mason-Dixon Line and west of the Mississippi River. As a native Floridian we used to call them snowbirds, and what we really hated more than anything else was the increased traffic.
rainy
(6,090 posts)of an attitude of workers being hired for cheep on visas so that employers didn't have to pay a minimum wage.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)but, as I said, I've had experience with East Coast Beach places. We have relatives up and down the coast and we love the beach. So we've been many places and noticed what you did.
These should be US College or late High School Student jobs...and not bringing in Foreign Students to be abused. Many of us in the 60's through the 80's put ourselves through college on the Summer Resort and Beach Jobs. In these times with Student Education Debt it's important for us to take care of our own kids...and I wouldn't want to see them abused either.
Yo_Mama
(8,303 posts)why are we doing this?
Those working in the US on J-1 visas aren't subject to FICA taxes, so their employers don't have to pay the FICA match:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J-1_visa
KoKo
(84,711 posts)past for Summer Temp employment...then why do they need to import J1Workers now.
So they can "exploit them" is what it seems from not only this article I posted but, NYT did an article back a few years ago about the exploitation of workers in those "Asian Restaurants" that pop up in every town in strip shopping centers. Those workers are moved around the country in buses and they are exploited by putting them up in run down motels in deplorable conditions, barely giving them enough to live on and then move them out of town so they don't have way of complaining to anyone.
Makes me wonder when Repugs & Dems want more "worker visas" for US as part of the Immigration Reform Bill.
Retrograde
(10,133 posts)There are J-1 visas that let employers bring in young people from overseas as a "learning experience": supposedly they get exposed to American culture while having a place to stay and some pocket money. In reality, it's a short-term savings for employers because they can pay sub-minimum wages, with no federal withholding taxes.
Sunlei
(22,651 posts)A lot of them pay, sometimes thousands to the contractor who advertises for them in foreign countries. The contractor takes care of the visas, the paychecks, housing, sets the 'rules'.
All the Corp has to do is order the work crew or teachers or nurses or whatever 'workers' they want from the contractor.
If they don't follow the 'rules' all the contractor has to do is call and have them deported. on the federal dime of course.
KoKo
(84,711 posts)of Immigration Reform ...because there are "hidden things" in that Bill that neither Repugs or Dems want to talk about. J-1 visas taking jobs away from American Youth to EXPLOIT innocent Foreign Students.
Recursion
(56,582 posts)If not, how do you know they're "foreign"?