Bling Bling in the ATL

Well, little news item yesterday: Chip Rogers introduced Senate Bill 529, the Georgia Security and Immigration Compliance Act.

As I understand, immigration is the wedge issue of the next election cycle, (although gay marriage never gets old...)

The bill does a couple of things:

1. denies public benefits to adults in the country illegally (I believe mothers and infants are exempted) and requires anyone arrested to prove their legal status; those who do not would be reported to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

2. require public contractors to hire only workers lawfully in the country.

Both of these have been on the radar.

The unexpected bits:

- Prohibits all employers from claiming wages paid to workers as a state income tax deduction unless those workers have documented they are here legally.
- does not force employers to enroll in a free federal program that runs background checks on workers' legal status.

And, theres a 25 year sentence for human traffickers, which is a nice touch I guess.

Illegal immigrants in Georgia range from 250,000 to 800,000. And this is GA there is the nativist fervor here you might expect... talk of 'invading our borders' and 'speak English' and 'illegal is ILLEGAL.' But theres also a sensible, working class thread to it: a feeling that illegals somehow underpin legal workers wages; are difficult to integrate into the community; and a resentment of big business. Zogby polled GA recently and reports that about 80 thought employers who hire illegal workers should be punished. 82 percent said the Legislature should take on the immigration issue. Time reports similar feelings nationwide: 63 percent said illegal immigration is an "extremely" or "very" serious problem and 74 percent said the government is not doing enough to curb illegal immigration.

I think most people see this as an economic/wage issue, framed as a nativist one with a sprinkling of national security and law-and-order, so that racists and authoritarians get energized to the polls. But still, the broad based appeal is as an economic/wage issue. And I wish I could say that the democrats in GA had a better way to tackle the economic issue, but they don't. The democrats in GA have always been beholden to the large rural farmers, and minimum wage remains where they left it: $5.15 an hour. So I don't have a sense that either party in GA offers positive solutions to wage issues.

All in all, I guess the devil is in the details and those will come out over the next few weeks. I haven't seen small businesses chip in and thats a surprise because while Vidalia onions might survive a crackdown on illegal immigration, I can't imagine that small contractors will. But I think its a good bill. It focuses primarily on the demand side of the equation - and with GOP controlling all three branches of government at the federal and state levels, what more can one expect?

- Ms. Bling

http://atlanta.bizjournals.com/atlanta/stories/2006/01/09/story2.html
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/stories/0210immigration.html