What’s really, really unfortunate, however, is this: These facilities are being built with U.S. tax dollars in support of America’s armed forces, and yet Guam has been duped into believing that this work has to be completed by foreign labor.
Why can’t U.S. labor be used from Guam, Hawaii and the mainland to build these facilities? Why can’t these jobs go to U.S. workers who will return this income back to their respective communities?
Technically, construction bidding will be open to any firm, but firms that use lower cost labor will have the advantage. To get some idea about the future of this build-up, read the PDN's story May 30 about foreign construction workers living in unfinished buildings and waiting to get paid.
Sen. Matt Rector attempted to limit use of foreign labor by imposing a $20,000 fee on each H-2B visa. His bill failed because Guam lawmakers lack the political will to come up with a method for ensuring that construction projects paid with federal tax dollars will pay the salaries of U.S. workers and not foreign labor. It really is an outrage, and, frankly, I think once more people realize outside of Guam just what is going on here, a storm will blow.
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3 comments:
advertise for these construction jobs in any city in the states and see how many responses you will get. You won't get close to 10% of the required workers from the states.
My understanding is that only up to 30% of the labor force can be non-American
It's good to know someone else is as outraged about the use of foreign labor as I have been. Under that plan the only people making big $$ will be the labor brokers.
Based upon some recent protest of the provision in a bill to limit foreign labor to 30% and make Hawaii union rates mandetory, it now seems appearant who's being paid off doesn't it. The sad thing is that the local labor would really benefit from this bill. A local union worker could actually make a living wage - but the Govenor is against that it appears and he would rather keep the local union workers poor and give all the money to the labor brokers.
Shame is all I can say. Wait till next election.
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