NewsTaco

By Maria Purísima, Pocho Ñews Service

(PNS reporting from WASHINGTON, D.C.) The Mexican-American Chamber of Commerce and the U.S. Labor Department are launching a campaign to promote Hispanic workers.

The Mexicans Work Better campaign encourages American business owners to hire Latino workers for whatever jobs are open and at whatever salary.

“Since the Spanish arrival in the Americas, Latinos have been great workers. We want to encourage U.S. business owners to continue to hire them, at whatever cost,” Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Adrian García told a Monday morning press conference in the Watergate Hotel.

“By hiring Latino workers, business owners get people with a good work ethic, and Latinos get the chance to buy themselves a pack of tortillas — maybe even two. It’s a fair trade.”

The massive Mexicans Work Better advertising campaign is set to run on television, radio, online and even through traditional mail. The message? American companies get more bang for their buck when they hire Hispanic.

The campaign also comes in light of a report of 11% unemployment for Latinos in the U.S.

“It’s great news for me,” said Filomon Hernandez, who has been unemployed since December. “If someone wants to give me a job, at this point, I’m willing to take it. I’m actually Salvadoran, but it’s not like it makes me work any less hard, nobody can tell the difference.”

García explained that the Mexicans Work Better campaign was meant to apply to all types of Latinos — from Puerto Ricans to Colombians to Guatemalans — since all Latinos are the same anyway.

“It’s an equal opportunity campaign,” he said. “We want all Latinos to feel like they can be Mexicans when it comes to taking whatever job for whatever compensation that’s agreeable to their employer.”

This article was first published in Pocho.com

POCHO ÑEWS SERVICE PNS IS A WHOLLY-FICTITIOUS SUBSIDIARY OF POCHISMO, INC., A CALIFORNIA CORPORATION, WHO IS A PERSON ACCORDING TO THE SUPREME COURT. DON’T ASK US, WE JUST WORK HERE.

[Photo by Pocho.com]

Despite being hard hit by the recent recession, a recent poll reported that 65 percent of Latinos believe the next generation will be better off than they are.

When it comes to median household wealth, the Fox News Latino poll showed that Latinos have seen the largest drop by any other group in the nation from 2005 through 2009. Additionally, Latinos have seen the largest increase in the poverty rate from 20.6% to 26.6%.

“Generally we always think that if your pocket book is hurt, you are going to punish the incumbent party,” said Todd Shields, Director of the Blair Center and Dean of the University of Arkansas Graduate School.

According to the same poll, which surveyed likely Latino voters, 58% of Latinos approve of the way Obama is handling the economy. They also favor President Barack Obama six-to-one over any of the Republican presidential candidates.

“It’s surprising to see this kind of optimism. These people are worse off, but they are still more positive about where the country is going,” Shields said. “It’s tough to turn that into a vote against the incumbent party.”

References:

• Fox News Latino

[Photo By o5com]

The Texas AFL-CIO and the Austin Central Labor Council launched a series of events during South By Southwest in Austin to highlight the importance of the workers who make the festival possible for the tens of thousands of visitors. The Work Connects Us All campaign is about highlighting the ways in which we are all connected by the work that we do, said René Lara, the legislative and political director for the Texas AFL-CIO.

“We are all connected through our work, and with this campaign we are thanking the workers,” Lara told NewsTaco of the public education campaign. He said the campaign is meant to highlight the importance of work, how it connects everyone, and also to replace negative ideas about unions in Texas with more positive ones using social media.

As part of the campaign Texas AFL-CIO employees and volunteers went around the festival taking photos of different workers — bartenders, taco vendors, trash collectors, stage hands and more — and shared the photos on Twitter and Facebook. (Photo above is an example). The campaign was preceded by a TV ad about the campaign that ran for six weeks leading up to SXSW.

Social media was important to the campaign because it’s focusing on young people, which in Austin means Latinos and African-Americans. Statewide, only about 5-6% of workers are unionized and the future of unions in the state is tightly very closely to this particular demographic. Thus, thanking workers and highlighting how their work connects everyone in the city, and the city’s visitors, is meant to set the stage for a more positive spin to unions in this state.

“If people weren’t picking up trash on 6th Street, this festival would turn pretty ugly pretty quick,” said Ed Stills, director of communications for the Texas AFL-CIO. “We’re all workers, we rely on each others’ work to get through the day.”

The Work Connects Us All campaign is part of a pilot program that is set to roll out nationally in the future.

[Courtesy Photo]

On December 2, 2011, Pomona College in Claremont, California fired 17 workers for failing to produce sufficient proof of their ability to work legally in the United States. Before the firings took place, food workers at the college, located in eastern Los Angeles County, had been trying to organize a union while also holding campus protests in hopes of earning better wages.

According to reports, the decision came as a shock to the workers, many of whom had been working at the college for 10 or even 20 years. One of the leaders of the unionization effort was quoted in the New York Times saying:

“We were here for a very long time and there was never a complaint,” said Christian Torres, 25, a cook who had worked at the college for six years. “But now all of the sudden we were suspect, and they didn’t want us to work here anymore.”

Months before the firings, it was reported that a gag order had been instated, prohibiting food service employees from talking to students in the dining halls, causing many to assume it was to prevent sympathizers from joining the workers’ cause.

All of this left the fired employees with many questions. Were the powers that be at Pomona College anti-union, anti-immigrant, or both?  If so many employees had worked there for years or decades without being required to provide proof of legal working status, why now?

According to the Workers For Justice website:

The demand for documentation was not brought on by a federal agency. Instead, Pomona launched the internal audit itself. Pomona administrators said they properly verified documents at the time of hiring, but claimed some workers had “discrepancies” and wanted documents again.

Since the controversy began, a large number of Pomona College students, faculty, and alumni are vocalizing their indignation, debating whether or not the school is living up to its liberal ideals. According to the same report from the New York Times, “Some alumni are now refusing to donate to the college, while some students are considering discouraging prospective freshmen from enrolling.”

Regardless of one’s legal status in this country, it has to be pretty devastating to work somewhere for years and then get handed a pink slip after months of chaos and uncertainty.  What’s most surprising to many is that it didn’t happen at a cut-throat corporation, but rather a liberal arts college.

References:

• The Daily Bulletin
• LA Weekly

[Photo By Amerique; Video By uniteherelocal11 ]

By René Lara, Political and Legislative Director of the Texas AFL-CIO

President Barack Obama recently  appointed three nominees to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the government agency that is supposed to protect workers who want to form a union in order to negotiate a contract with their employer. For years that agency has been rendered powerless by laws that allow employers to scare employees into voting against forming a union.

For the past several years, a group of Republican senators have been blocking every one of President Barack Obama’s major initiatives and many of his appointments, including those to the NRLB. They could do this through their power to filibuster as long as they had 41 votes to block a measure or an appointment. In fact, senators used the same rules to block major civil rights laws many years ago. Speaking through his actions, President Obama just said, “¡Ya basta!”

The business community and their U.S. Senate allies have loved to hate the NLRB, since its establishment in 1934, because it also investigates unfair labor practices. During the Obama administration, employers and their Senate friends did not want friendlier appointments to the consumer agency and the NLRB. What they wanted was for that agency not to operate — period. This is how they were blocking the President’s appointments: the Constitution allows the president to appoint persons to posts while the Congress is in recess. When the senators were out of town, they simply acted like they were still working by having a few senators gavel them into session, sometimes just for a few minutes.

The President has just challenged and bypassed that Senate procedure, thereby rocking the balance-of-power boat in our nation’s government.

Decisionmakers ought to take a longer-term view of labor unions.  As the influence of the NLRB and labor grew after the 1930s, workers’ wages went up and unions created pension funds that provided capital for businesses to invest. It is no coincidence that the power and influence of the United States grew as its citizenry became prosperous — in the last century.

El Presidente just landed a hard upper-cut on some powerful Republican senators. He did so on behalf of workers — that means you and me.

René Lara of El Paso is the Political and Legislative Director of the Texas AFL-CIO, a state federation of labor unions representing 220,000 working people and their families at the Texas state capitol.

By Hector Barajas, Director of Strategic Communications at Revolvis Consulting

Enough already with this Occupy Wall Street nonsense.

Don’t get me wrong, every month I write that check for my underwater mortgage, pay the car insurance and deal with other necessities, I dream up a million other ways on how to spend that money. While I might not like writing those checks, I sure do enjoy the fact that my family has a roof over their head, food on the table, and some hot water for that shower.

I grew up in an immigrant household. For my parents, their migration to the United States was about opportunity and building a better life for themselves and their eventual family. They were two immigrants with less than a grade school education, traveling to a foreign country, where they did not speak the language or know the customs or traditions.

Forty-two years ago, when my parents ventured into this new country, the only thing they had was each other and a work ethic that is as strong and old as this country’s history. They didn’t whine or complain, they just worked hard and took the necessary steps to make their own situation better.

Over the past 20 years, my parents have opened their home to nearly 52 kids. In a foster home, you quickly realize that life is rarely easy and nothing comes for free. Many of these kids are just looking for a safe and secure place, away from an abuser. Others spent weeks hoarding food, wondering if the next day the food was going to disappear, and for most, they spent days, weeks, months, years and for some a lifetime wondering why their parents had abandoned them. Life wasn’t and isn’t easy for those kids, and fairness was something they had to fight for at the most basic level.

Most of these kids now live productive lives; some went off to college and other into the military. Every holiday more and more chairs are added and more tamales are consumed – each of us kids seem to be bringing a few more people as the years go by. The progress we’ve each made has come only through our own willingness to take responsibility for the direction of our lives and set achievable goals.

Working your way up can and will happen, but it will not fall in your lap.

One of my first jobs was cleaning the bathrooms of a four-story building – this helped me pay for summer classes. Years later, I was grateful to a friend who helped me get a job with her brother as a plumber assistant. Changing water heaters and trying to dig our way to a collapsed sewer pipe, this wasn’t very glamorous work, but it was an honest job. After hours of scrubbing and digging you learn to appreciate that dollar earned.

The same is true for my cousins who spent their summers in the California fields of the Central Valley. Underneath that blistering sun, they earned and saved their money, and eventually put themselves through college.

None of us attended Ivy League schools or some nationally ranked institutions, we did with what we had and made the best of our opportunities. We did it by taking responsibility for ourselves and for each other.

Maybe it’s an age thing, but now that I am approaching 40, I can’t seem to understand how camping out in the streets for weeks, banging on drums, not showering for days, and complaining to those passing by is somehow going to change your economic situation, make your debt disappear or help you get a job.

And if you aren’t getting results, how is that a good use of your time?

There is nothing wrong with starting at the bottom, most people do. There is also nothing wrong with updating your skill sets, learning a new trade and not losing sight of your goals and dreams. When our economy begins to recover, how you spend your time and the opportunities you seek today will inevitably help determine where and how you end-up.

Hector Barajas is the Director of Strategic Communications at Revolvis Consulting, a Republican political analyst for Univision and Telemundo and communications consultant for GROW Elect. Over the past 14 years, Hector has served as the communications director for the California Senate Republican leader and Caucus, the California Victory 2008 campaign, Spanish media spokesman for the Republican National Committee, the McCain/Palin ‘08, and Bush/Cheney ’04 presidential campaigns and for Governor Schwarzenegger ‘03, ‘06 and Meg Whitman ’10.

Latinos continue to suffer from a higher unemployment rate than the national average, according to a report from Hispanic Business:

The unemployment rate for Hispanics ticked up a notch in October to 11.4 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ “Employment Situation – October 2011.” For the year, the Hispanic unemployment rate has averaged 11.6 percent per month, down from a high 13.2 percent in November 2010.

The total unemployment rate fell to 9 percent in October with 80,000 jobs added to the nonfarm payroll ranks. Adjusted figures for the previous two months showed a revision upward in the number of jobs added—from 57,000 to 104,000 in August and from 103,000 to 158,000 in September.

Overall, 1.3 million jobs have been added since Jan. 1, an average of 125,600 per month.

We’ve written several times about high Latino unemployment, and although it would appear the statistic has come down some, it’s still off.

[Photo By Sean MacEntee]

Workers at a Santa Monica, California car wash were recently victorious in their efforts to unionize. Bonus Car Wash workers have been working towards a union since 2008 and with the help of several organizations, including the AFL-CIO. Now workers there are set to become members of the United Steel, Paper and Forestry, Rubber, Manufacturing, Energy, Allied Industrial and Service Workers International Union, or, United Steelworkers.

Here’s a statement from the union:

Oliverio Gomez, who has worked at Bonus Car Wash for nine years, said, “I’m so happy we have a union and a contract. Now we get to take our breaks, if we’re thirsty we can drink water, and they respect the schedule, and all of the hours we work are in our paycheck. But the biggest difference is we finally get respect as workers.”

Workers at Marina and Bonus Car Wash have been seeking to unionize since 2008. They formed organizing committees at both carwashes to push for improvements, engaged in worksite actions, and made presentations to dozens of local community groups, churches and synagogues to gain public support for their efforts to form a union and win a contract.

The contract includes a wage increase, health and safety protections, grievance and arbitration procedures and protections for workers if the carwash is sold. The agreement also establishes rights that protect workers from being unfairly punished or dismissed, among other things.

There’s more here.

[Photo By joelk75]

By America’s Voice Education Fund

On September 28th, 2011, the most sweeping anti-immigration law in the country went into effect in Alabama.  The law, HB 56, has already had harsh and sweeping consequences—hurting not only undocumented immigrants but legal residents, native-born U.S. citizens, and the state’s reputation on the national stage.  HB 56 has created a climate of hostility for Hispanics and immigrants that has caused many of them to flee the state or lock themselves in their houses, while devastating Alabama’s agriculture and construction industries and creating massive bureaucratic hassles for citizens who are just trying to get their vehicle tags renewed.  While the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ordered Alabama to stop enforcing two provisions of the law on October 14th, the damage they caused may be irreversible—and the rest of the law remains in effect.  What’s truly shocking, though, is that not only have the law’s defenders failed to express concern about its consequences on Alabama families, but they’re proud of them—and say the law is working as intended.

Here are ten things to know about the new Alabama anti-immigration law:

1. Children are too afraid to risk going to school.  One provision of HB 56 forces teachers and school administrators to check not only the immigration status of all new students, but also the status of their parents.  While the 11th Circuit Court ruled on October 14th that Alabama had to temporarily stop enforcing this provision, it was in full effect for over two weeks of classes and is still a part of Alabama law.  Some schools interrogated previously enrolled students as well; the Birmingham News reported that one school even called Hispanic students into the cafeteria and asked them to publicly disclose the legal status of their parents.  And Hispanic students weren’t the only ones who felt targeted: school counselor Roseann Rodriguez told Huffington Post that “My sixth graders of African American descent were asking me if they were going to have to go back to Africa.”  As of October 7th, at least 2,300 children were missing from Alabama schools.  All of these children are constitutionally guaranteed a right to an education; many of them are native-born U.S. citizens whose parents happen to be undocumented.
2. Humble workers and families with strong ties to Alabama are being treated like criminals.  HB 56 forces police officers in Alabama to ask anyone they stop who they think might be undocumented to prove their immigration status.  Furthermore, it nullifies all contracts with undocumented immigrants, and makes it a crime for any branch of state government to do business with them, leading to new verification provisions affecting all Alabama residents.  It has created a climate of fear for Latinos in the state, who feel like “suspects” every time they leave their home.  As Maribel Hastings of America’s Voice Españolreported, “One young father from Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico told me, through tears, that his 12-year-old son, who is undocumented, has always been an honor student who recently won a school trip to go to the Space Museum in Huntsville. He didn’t go, because he was afraid the police would detain him.  ‘We don’t have much time to think it over … maybe we can get our affairs in order here in two or three weeks and see what our options are, maybe moving to another state, or straight to Mexico,’ the father said.  Some families don’t dare to leave the house, even to get basic items like food.  The church deacon said that he knew people who had gone days without leaving to buy groceries; he had offered to bring them food himself.  Those who do leave the house do so knowing the risk they take.” One woman interviewed even said that her U.S.-born children had the flu, but she was afraid to take them to the doctor.
3. Families are being denied access to basic necessities, like water.  The Guardian newspaper reported on a warning posted in the small town of Allgood, Alabama: “The poster is mildly worded, but carries a very big punch. ‘Attention to all water customers,’ it begins. ‘To be compliant with new laws concerning immigration you must have an Alabama driver’s license…’  And then comes the hit: ‘… or you may lose water service.’  The warning, posted in the offices of a public water company in the small town of Allgood in Alabama, is the most graphic illustration yet of the draconian new immigration law coming into effect in the state.”  That’s right, because of the law, families are being denied basic utilities, like water, unless they can show papers.
4. The climate of hostility is even targeting legal immigrants and Hispanic citizens.  The law is encouraging private citizens to harass people based on the color of their skin, in a chilling repeat of the darkest days of Alabama’s history. The Alabama Press-Register told the story of 18-year-old Jessica Pineda: “She now rarely leaves home, except to go to work. She stays in Alabama because it’s where her family stays.  ‘I was born in the United States,’ she said. ‘I know I have my American rights.  But if I go outside people are going to think I’m illegal. I get scared because we have the color.’  And NPR intervieweda 16-year-old native-born U.S. citizen who reported getting teased by classmates at school, who jeered, “Are you going back to Mexico, man?” “It kinda makes me angry,” he told NPR, “but I can’t do anything about it. I can’t help the way I was born, the color skin that I have.”
5. Police are confused about how to enforce the law, and worried that they will have to divert resources from serious crimes.  Several outlets have reported that there is widespread confusion and uncertainty among police about how to enforce the law.  After the law was supposed to go into effect, Randy Christian, chief deputy of the Jefferson County Sheriff Department, told Reuters that his officers “have to get some answers on how we actually enforce it and how we can do so without involving racial profiling.” Boaz Police Chief Terry Davis, who heads a group of 365 Alabama police chiefs, told the Associated Press, “We just need to know what to do without getting everyone in trouble. We’re all sort of confused right now.”  Birmingham Police Chief A.C. Roper has been a forceful opponent of the law itself. He expressed concern that training for the law would strain his department’s budget and told a Birmingham TV station, “As chief of Birmingham, illegal immigration is not in my top ten. Homicides, robberies, rapes, burglaries, car theft—those are the sort of things that are in my top ten. Not whether the person who’s over here painting houses is here illegally. But the state has shifted their priorities. That’s one of the concerns I have with the law. Because as the chief police officer for this city, I should set the priorities for this police department.”
6. The exodus of Hispanics and immigrants is threatening local businesses and destroying the economic base of whole communities.  As reported by the Alabama Press-Register, one Mexican restaurant owner in the small town of Robertsdale estimated that his customer base has shrunk by 75% – from 100 customers a day to 25.  A baker estimated his had shrunk by 90%.  One family told a reporter that they were considering closing their restaurant and moving to Mississippi to find business.
7. Farmers and construction business owners are already facing disaster.  Business owners are watching their Hispanic and immigrant workforce disappear—not only undocumented immigrants, but legal immigrants as well. Housing developer Bill Brett told NPR, “We’ve had many employees leave that were legal. Maybe a family member wasn’t legal, or maybe a close friend or relative.  Or maybe they’re just scared of being targeted and they’re just uncomfortable staying in this community and working here.”  The Associated General Contractors of Alabama estimate that about one-fourth of the entire construction work force has already left the state.  The agriculture industry is faring even worse: it’s harvest time, and their crops are rotting in the fields.  One family farmer told CBS News that the labor shortage would cost his family around $150,000 this year.  Shortly after HB 56 went into effect, according to the Associated Press, 50 desperate Alabama farmers met with one of the law’s sponsors to complain; when he dismissed their complaints, and told them “The law will be in effect this entire growing season,” one farmer replied, “There won’t be no next growing season.”
8. Bureaucracy overrun – Alabamians are waiting in out-the-door lines to get their vehicle tags renewed.  Because of new ID requirements under HB 56, lines for annual vehicle tag renewal are so long that officials at the Birmingham DMV have had to add portable toilets, according to the Associated Press.  The added burden has thrown state employees and citizens so far behind schedule that the state is allowing citizens whose tags expired in September to get a 20-day extension on renewing them.  Even after the extension was granted, NPR reported that visitors to the Birmingham office had to arrive at 4:30 to get in front of the line, while those who arrived after the office had opened had to wait in line for six hours.
9. African-American and civil rights leaders are outraged that Alabama is repeating a bleak chapter of its history on civil rights and race relations.  U.W. Clemon, the former Chief Judge of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Alabama and a career civil-rights activist, told Jose Antonio Vargas, “In some very serious ways, [the initial ruling to uphold most of the law] was mistaken.  Ours is a country basically that is based on immigration.  We are a nation of immigrants. Only two categories of Americans don’t fall into the category of immigrants, and that is the Native Americans – the Indians – and the black Americans.  We’re the only ones who didn’t seek to come here.  Everybody else has to look to Europe, or Asia, in terms of their background, in terms of their ancestors coming to America, most of them without having to go through all kinds of hoops to become Americans.  They just showed up, and worked hard…[Under HB 56] the Hispanic man is the new Negro. It’s a sad thing to say, and I think it reflects reality.”  And Congressman John Lewis, a close ally of Dr. Martin Luther King, told a school audience in Georgia,  “Here in Georgia, in my native Alabama, some other parts of the South, you hear this free debate about immigration.  We don’t want to go back.  We wanna go forward as a nation, as a people.  We all came from some other part of the world…so we all are immigrants ourselves.  Dr. King said on one occasion, ‘We should learn to live together as brethren and sisters.’”
10. … and the law’s champions are delighted. They say everything is going according to plan.  WhenPOLITICO asked Republican Congressman Mo Brooks of Alabama about “unintended consequences” of HB 56, like the mass absences of his state’s Hispanic children, Brooks replied: “Those are the intended consequences of Alabama’s legislation with respect to illegal aliens.  We don’t have the money in America to keep paying for the education of everybody else’s children from around the world.”  Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach, one of the architects of Alabama’s law and Arizona’s SB 1070, told a conference that driving Hispanics out of the state was just an efficient way to enforce the law: “People are picking up and leaving…You’re encouraging people to comply with the law on their own.  Nobody gets arrested.  Nobody spends time in detention.  We don’t expend resources in removal proceedings…I’d say that’s a good thing.”  And Alabama’s U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions called the exodus of Hispanic families from the state “a rational response” to the law.  When talk radio host Laura Ingraham asked Sessions, “Do you think it’s bad that all these Hispanic kids have disappeared from the schools?”, Sessions replied, “All I would just say to you is that it’s a sad thing that we’ve allowed a situation to occur for decades that large numbers of people are in the country illegal, and it’s going to have unpleasant, unfortunate consequences.”

For more information on the effects of the Alabama immigration law, visit:

• Quotes from Alabama locals and a detailed explanation of the law (Center for American Progress)
• Link to Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice

This post originally appeared on America’s Voice Education Fund.

[Photo By Alabama.gov]

I can’t discuss immigration without getting upset. There are times that the topic makes me want to cry and/or flip a table over. When people refer to “illegal immigrants,” they are referring to my family, so it’s much more than a political issue for me. And I’m not ashamed to appear “too emotional.” My parents left their hometown to escape poverty. Growing up in desolate rural Mexico, they were only able to obtain a sixth grade education, and when they got married, there were very few jobs available. My paternal grandmother told me that my family was so poor that sometimes they would eat nothing but beans for weeks at a time.

Out of desperation, my parents crossed the border in the trunk of a Cadillac in 1978.

My parents first arrived to Los Angeles where an aunt and uncle already lived. My father worked as a bus boy at the Brown Derby in Hollywood. My older brother was born soon after they arrived. Life in LA proved to be too hard so they quickly moved to Chicago where my mother’s brothers lived. In Chicago, my parents worked as laborers. My dad worked at a Cheesecake Factory for many years and then later at an industrial filter factory where he is now a supervisor. My mother worked at paper packaging factory. It is repetitive, brutal, and dehumanizing work.

I remember the glue burns my dad used to get on his arms from accidents with the machines and my mom’s hands covered with deep paper cuts. In the summer, there was no air conditioning. My mom said that once a rat ran up a woman’s pant leg. Occasionally, “la migra” would raid these factories, rounding up all the undocumented, tearing apart families, and ruining lives. Luckily, my parents were never caught. I wonder what would have happened to us if they had been.

For many years, I hardly saw my mother because she had to work the evening shift. She left to work as soon as we got home from school and then didn’t come home until midnight. My parents were perpetually tired, something I didn’t really understand at the time. Despite their exhaustion and low wages, they were still able to raise us well. We didn’t have much, but I remember I always had plenty of books. We also never lacked food. There was always a big pot of beans on the stove. My parents, along with many illegal immigrants, were lucky enough to be granted amnesty during the Reagan administration, something that is impossible to imagine happening now. In the 90s they became citizens.

Now, I would say that they’re as American as they are Mexican.

My parents are the most hardworking people I know. Contrary to what many believe, immigrants aren’t leeches. Even at our poorest, my family was never on any sort of public aid, and even if they had been, no one should begrudge them for that. They never came here to take what wasn’t theirs. They pay taxes. They provide cheap labor and perform jobs that no one else wants. They contribute to society. They raised highly productive and intelligent children. They taught us to work hard, harder than other people, because people like us don’t succeed unless we prove ourselves tenfold.

If I could reason with those who hate immigrants, I would tell them these things. I would explain that most people don’t want to leave their homeland and leave their families. I don’t think my father has ever come to terms with leaving Mexico. Any person in dire circumstances would leave to survive. Unfortunately, these people don’t operate with reason, logic, or compassion.

When Obama was elected, I was filled with hope. I imagined our country transforming. Now, I’m disillusioned with the administration for many reasons, but my biggest disappointment has been its immigration reform. Promises have been blatantly broken. According to Reuters, “The Obama administration had deported about 1.06 million as of September 12, against 1.57 million in Bush’s two full presidential terms.” Obama obviously didn’t fulfill his promise to have a comprehensive reform bill in Congress in his first year. And though he did support the DREAM Act last year, the bill failed in the Senate at the end of the Democrat-run 111th Congress.

Of course I can’t help but take immigration issues personally. When people hate illegal immigrants, they hate many wonderful, resilient, and inspiring people I know. They hate where I come from.  I wonder how so many Americans can be devoid of such basic empathy and I fear what that means for our future here.

[Photo By Celso Flores]

By Marlen Castañeda

Iʼm looking through Craigslist, as I usually do each day after checking e-mails and such. Iʼm browsing and decide to look at the gigs, under domestic. House cleaning seems to be something a lot of people want these days — but they donʼt just want anyone cleaning their house.

They want a very detailed cleaning, leaving a pristine, immaculate home. They want their home cleaner than it was when they bought it new. Thatʼs not a bad thing; I clean my house daily. And I donʼt just straighten up. I do the works, from bathrooms to floors. I just like my house clean and Iʼm able to do it, so why not.

So as Iʼm reading these requests for housecleaners, I see a trend. They all want a background check, understandable these days. They want perfect English, somewhat understandable, but since many housecleaners are Latina women, it isn’t a guarantee. They want you to work from this time to this time. Okay, so theyʼre setting the hours they want this done. They want a very specific list of things done. Can do.

Thereʼs one thing I have a problem with, though: the low rate these folks want to pay!

House work is hard! Any housewife will tell you that. It is backbreaking, grueling, nasty work! You got to reach up to high places, climb on ladders, bend over, on your knees reach under things, scrub ʻtil youʼre raw in the fingers, expose yourself to strong chemicals, touch the nastiest of areas, and do it all with a smile, because heaven forbid you utter a sound of disgust.

I know this firsthand. Not only do I clean my own house daily now, I cleaned houses for a few years myself. It was nasty, hard work. And unless you have cleaned houses for a living, you do not see the work that goes into it. Why? Because most of these houses youʼre cleaning are for nasty people who never clean themselves. They can live in their filth all year long, then when you come to their house to clean up their nastiness, they decide they are the cleanest, pickiest people and want you to do it all for them — and then they get to say how much you get paid.

Well Iʼm just here to speak a little bit for all these house cleaners, because:

1. They are mainly women.

2. They are Latina women.

Being a Latina who has cleaned houses I just want to ask the people looking for house cleaners: How dare you insult the hard degrading work it is to clean house by offering such an insulting wage?! Most of you people seeking maids are setting a price of $6 to $8 dollars an hour. This is an insult! Mainly because it usually takes a really good maid about five hours to clean a house. So to be paid such a small amount is not even worth it. If you do find a maid who is willing to be paid anything under ten dollars an hour, she probably isnʼt doing a good job, and is not a real maid. A maid can do so much in those five hours that she must be compensated fairly for it. Mainly because this is not a typical minimum wage job.

First of all, you do not clean your own mess, so how dare you put such a low price on cleaning up other peoplesʼ mess? Just because the majority of these people are women and are Latina does not mean just any person can do it. Any person can attempt to do it, but it isn’t always to your liking, right? Have a little respect for your  ” or “housekeeper.”

Remember that she is human and usually has a husband and children she does this at home as well. Remember she has needs such as “thirst” and ” using the restroom.”  Every other minimum wage job entitles their employees to breaks and such. Why canʼt a housekeeper take five minutes to have a drink and restroom break? Why do you all assume that because she is working ”only” 6 hours in your home she doesn’t still have basic human needs?

Respect her. She cleans your home and is probably the only one doing it, so show her the same respect she shows your home. Don’t assume that because she does the most demeaning of jobs that she as a person can be demeaned. She is usually a mother and wife. Don’t assume that she always has time for your needs. She makes time for you, make time for her. And the most important, don’t tell her what you will be paying her. Trust me in the fact that if she is charging you what you may consider an outrageous price, she is probably doing so because its a lot of work involved. Think about it. When did you last clean that tub? When did you last dust that high ceiling fan? When did you last dig under your five year-oldʼs bed? And why haven’t you done it since?

Most of the time these are trustworthy women who really need the job and aren’t out “to get you.” Trust in the fact that they are pricing you correctly and if you do want to negotiate, let her know why and most times she is flexible. The main reason she does this job is because its what she knows. Sheʼs good at it and it allows her to help her own family, to pay for that thing she has as well, you know, a house.

Marlen Castañeda lives in McKinney, Texas.

[Photo By Pink Sherbet Photography]

After one grueling August, President Obama tried to re-inspire voters in a Labor Day speech in Detroit yesterday, previewing elements of his address to Congress planned for Thursday.  While many Americans used the day as a well deserved break from work, it was a painful reminder to a large segment of  unemployed and underemployed workers that job prospects are still dismal and the economy is not looking any better.

The President’s remarks are of particular importance to the hardest hit by the recession and unemployment, Latinos and blacks, since, as mentioned previously in NewsTaco, these groups were hit the hardest by the recession.

Without revealing any specific details, the President suggested job creation may take the form of rebuilding the nation’s roads and bridges, opening new markets to US goods using trade deals, and addressing Republicans directly, cutting taxes for the middle class.

Obama also appealed for bipartisan action on the matter, stating:

“I’m going to propose ways to put America back to work that both parties can agree to, because I still believe both parties can work together to solve our problems.  Given the urgency of this moment, given the hardship that many people are facing, folks have got to get together. But we’re not going to wait for them.”

Later in the speech the President called out Republicans again saying:

“It’s time for those elected officials to stop worrying about their own jobs and to start worrying about those of working men and women.”

The nation will have to tune in to part two of Obama’s speech Thursday to see if his plans for economic recovery and job growth are feasible. So after a month filled with hurricanes, earthquakes, record-breaking heat, and continued economic malaise, here’s hoping to a better September.

[Photo By Obama-Biden Transition Project]

The Washington Post profiled Labor Secretary Hilda Solis this week. In the interview Solis shared some memories about her childhood near LA which seem to point to the fact that, ever since she was a child, she was being prepared for the work she is currently going. Here’s an excerpt:

When Hilda Solis was 10 years old, her mother worked in a factory that made Barbie dolls, and she would bring them home. “I love dolls,” Solis said. “When I was a kid I had, like, every Barbie doll.”

But her mother’s job had a down side, too: It meant Hilda had to help care for her infant twin sisters. “We had to cook, clean. You wouldn’t believe, back then we had to wash diapers. Rows and rows of diapers,” she said of the work that she and her older sister did. “I had to grow up fast.”

Solis hasn’t stopped working. She got her first paying job at age 14, in a youth center, and worked through high school, becoming the first member of her family to go to college.

The rest of the interview also notes that, as the third of seven children, Solis had to learn to fend for herself. That her father worked in a battery recycling plant, where he was a labor leader, helping his co-workers receive better pay. And that a high school teacher encouraging her to go to college made all the difference for her. For more read the interview here.

[Photo By DOL]

Earlier this month, “The Harvest,” a film about underage farmworkers debuted in theaters in New York and Los Angeles. Following three workers ages 12-16, the film documents their daily lives in which they wake before sunrise, skip school for work in the fields, and spend the day laboring under the blazing sun picking produce in exchange for as little as $60 a week.

As highlighted in a recent report on “60 Minutes,” youth labor on farms is nothing new in America.  Many other Americans, including those who weren’t children or grandchildren of migrant laborers like those depicted in the story, also worked in the fields to help support their families.  Though the work is extremely difficult, physically strenuous, and at times risky, many adult farmworkers depend on the income their children bring in to survive.

The reason kids are allowed to work at very young ages and in unsafe conditions, is a legal loophole under Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, in which underage farmworkers have very little rights. The act established a minimum age (14), a minimum wage and maximum number of work hours per week for most children, but exempted agriculture since many farms were family-owned and depended on offspring to keep them running. Since then, the American economy has changed drastically and corporations have used the loophole to benefit from inexpensive child labor.

Which is why Congresswoman Lucille Roybal-Allard (CA-34) introduced the Children’s Act for Responsible Employment, (CARE H.R. 3654),  to Congress in 2009, to help protect children who work in fields.  CARE aims to provide these underage workers, approximately 400,000 – most of whom were born in the U.S., with the same rights as kids their age in other industries.  According to her website, Roybal-Allard created this legislation stating:

Our farmworker children deserve the same protections given to children in other industries; if they are too young they should not be working, and if they are working, they deserve protection from long hours and unsafe work practices.

As shown in “The Harvest,” those unsafe practices include the use of unstable equipment to pick fruit from high trees and exposure to toxic chemicals.  A review of the movie in vivelohoy.com quotes one 16-year-old from the film who claims the skin on his hands started to fall off due to the chemicals he worked around.

Aside from creating greater protections in the workplace, the CARE Act also aims to keep young laborers in school.  In a speech on Capitol Hill in June, Roybal-Allard pointed out that, because they move with the crops from location to location, “child farmworkers drop out of school at four times the national dropout rate”, which keeps them from advancing economically in the future.

Representative Roybal-Allard has tried to introduce similar legislation to Congress since 2001, and despite all of the arguments in favor of protecting child laborers, and 107 co-sponsors, CARE has yet to become law.  Until then, American consumers will continue to enjoy the fruits and vegetables of child labor.

References:

• The Huffington Post