The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the American Council on International Personnel issued a report Aug. 11 highlighting the importance of highly skilled foreign workers and blasting arguments made by the AFL-CIO in favor of a commission to determine the future flow of guestworkers.

According to the report, titled Regaining America's Competitive Advantage: Making Our Immigration System Work, the “admission of high skilled foreign nationals provides significant benefits to the U.S. economy and much of the criticism levied at such foreign nationals and their employers is misplaced.”

Part of the chamber's report focuses on rebutting a study  released in Dec. 2009 by AFL-CIO's Department for Professional Employees that found that employers who use the H-1B program often abuse the system, by claiming false labor shortages to justify importing workers who then are intimidated and forced to work for low pay.

“Closing the door to highly educated individuals who allow U.S. companies to remain successful and competitive will weaken, not strengthen, our country's economy,” said Randel K. Johnson, senior vice president of labor, immigration, and employee benefits for the chamber. “The best policy for the United States is one that sides with freedom and innovation, not restriction,” he added.

Stan Sorscher is Legislative Director at the Society for Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA), a union representing over 20,000 scientists, engineers, technical and professional employees in the aerospace industry. He has been with SPEEA since 2000.  

Stan has a BS in Physics from the University of Michigan, and a PhD in physics from UC Berkeley. He worked on X-ray imaging, image reconstruction and image processing, ultrasonic imaging, optics, and noise analysis. Many years ago, he worked did research in statistical physics and biophysics.

Stan is an activist in Seattle Washington, working on trade, economic development, health care, immigration, workforce development and education in science technology engineering and math.  

He manages a co-ed softball team, where he imagines he is the 6th best shortstop on the team, depending on who shows up.

As the economy struggles, we are told that education will be the key to renewed prosperity. So, I was quite surprised to read in the New York Times about a mother who was accused of over-investing in her daughter's college education, by borrowing to send her to NYU. After graduation, they realized the daughter's employment prospects fell well short of the income she would need to pay off her loans.

The article left the impression that the family's resources would have been better spent on some other investment, perhaps real estate, or T-bills.

Follw this link for the rest of the story.