A group of Democratic and GOP legislators will stand with business owners at 9:30 a.m. EST to jointly demand the government provide more H-2B seasonal visa-workers.
The demand at the Capitol Hill press conference for more workers comes as many employers have begun competing for workers by offering higher wages, after many years of flat or declining blue-collar wages.
The live stream above will begin as soon as the event is underway.
Business owners, plus the labor brokers which supply seasonal workers to many employers, say they need imported seasonal workers because they cannot hire Americans for seasonal landscaping, forestry, resort, and restaurant work.
The owners also say they cannot afford to hire Americans at the wages needed to hire Americans away from other jobs and say they cannot raise prices because their sales will fall.
Studies suggest the H-2B workers are paid less than local wages earned by Americans. American wages likely would also rise if the companies had to compete for productive American workers.
DHS Nielsen OKs 30K extra H-2B visa workers, so 2019 inflow is 96K. Expands summer biz for CEOs by cutting blue-collar wages. Not 'Hire American' – but gives cheap crab-meat to DC media! BTW, US has 1.5M+ white-collar visa workers who lower grads' salaries https://t.co/jyoKaiUHoS
— Neil Munro (@NeilMunroDC) March 30, 2019
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