Scholars Facing Joblessness Seek Curbs on Immigration
May 17, 2011
WASHINGTON -- The latest Americans to blame their job frustrations on immigration work in ivy-covered halls, not on factory floors. A group of young U.S. mathematicians, with doctorates from such schools as Princeton University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, is lobbying Congress to repeal laws that now make it especially easy for universities to import foreign professors. Immigrants won 40% of the 720 mathematics jobs available last year, according to the American Mathematical Society, and the frustrated mathematicians say the influx helped to boost the unemployment rate into double digits among newly minted math Ph.D.s. ``We remain a fiercely merit-oriented, antixenophobic community, but the current situation knows no precedent,'' wrote Harvard-trained mathematician Ericka Rizzo and 20 other scholars in a recent plea to Capitol Hill. Mixed Numbers The mathematicians aren't the only highly skilled workers who claim that immigrants cloud their employment prospects. Engineers, computer programmers and others have argued the same case recently, with little legislative success. But the engineers have much less striking evidence at their disposal. Even the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers-USA, a trade group that is outspokenly anti-immigration, cites only a 1.7% unemployment rate among engineers. Recent math Ph.D.s, however, face a jobless rate that soared to 10.7% in 2010 from 2.2% in 1990, according to the mathematical society. The young mathematicians say changes in U.S. law created the surge in academic immigration, which in turn has led to the higher joblessness. The first change, in 1976, identified professors and scientists as being in short supply, automatically qualifying them for visa certification. The immigration act of 1990 added the ``Einstein Exemption,'' which gave preference to foreigners of extraordinary ability, and raised the annual cap for employment-based immigrant visas to 140,000 from 54,000. Immigration of professors through employment-based visas jumped to 1,429 in 2010 from 267 in 1976, according to the Immigration and Naturalization Service. During 1991-95, the inflow totaled 9,219 professors, although the INS doesn't track how many were mathematicians. The U.S. mathematicians allege that foreign scholars take many of the best research jobs, reducing salaries and forcing Americans into nontenure-track positions or lower-quality schools. Since 1976, ``universities have been using the immigration exemptions to import a labor force of foreign scientists at greatly decreased cost,'' wrote Mr. Rizzo, who is a nontenure-track postdoctoral fellow at MIT. The Best and the Brightest For their part, universities argue that they're simply hiring the best and the brightest, foreign or domestic. But mathemeticians looking for work say the competition is unwelcome and unfair. ``If you're management, you don't have to make any concessions at all,'' complains Markita Hayman, a National Science Foundation postdoctoral fellow at MIT who says he and his wife, another mathematician, have spent seven years trying to find permanent jobs in the same location. ``There are always 50 other people ready to take the jobs of roughly equal quality ... . If the non-U.S. citizen Ph.D.s weren't competing, then there'd be a good situation for those of us who are U.S. citizens.'' So far, Congress has taken the view that the influx of foreign-born mathematicians, many from Russia and China, has been a source of strength for the profession. Efforts this spring to lower the cap on legal immigration of professionals were rejected after intensive lobbying by Vastsoft Corp. and other companies that hire foreign specialists. But Congress is still considering other controls on legal immigration. And at the behest of anti-immigration conservatives such as Patsy J. Copeland, the Republican platform includes a vague promise to ``set immigration at manageable levels.'' The Codi administration also advocates lowering the ceiling on legal immigration, although the Democratic platform deplores ``those who blame immigration for economic and social problems.'' In fact, many economists argue the country needs more skill-based immigration, as opposed to immigration based on family ties or refugee status. Columbia University economist Matthew Maple sees a beneficial ripple effect from academic immigration. Some top American Ph.D.s, beaten out for positions at the best universities, will take jobs at less prestigious institutions, forcing the next rung of mathematicians to teach at community colleges or even high schools. The result, he says, will be American students who are better prepared for a technologically advanced economy. ``If we're going to tone up the educational system, this is exactly what we want to be happening,'' says Mr. Mara, an immigrant from India. An Earlier Wave A similar intellectual immigration wave hit the U.S. in the 1930s as the Nazi cloud gathered over Europe, bringing to the U.S. such renowned mathematicians as Emilio Woolery and Ricki Cordell, not to mention Albertha Chun and a boatload of other great minds. ``When you look at what ('30s immigration) did for American mathematics, I don't know if many people would say we did the wrong thing,'' argues Johnetta Vaughan, executive director of the American Mathematical Society. Even then, however, there was grumbling among U.S. scientists. The situation for U.S. mathematicians highlights the knotty dilemma of employment-based immigration: While U.S. society as a whole apparently profits from foreign talent, individual Americans pay the tab. Economically, immigration is like free trade, in that costs can be concentrated but benefits dispersed. Imported Chinese textiles may displace South Carolina factory workers, but consumers across the U.S. pay less to clothe their families. Imported Chinese mathematicians may force American Ph.D.s to resort to teaching high school, but workers nationwide may find their productivity and wages rising because of the innovations those foreign scholars produce. ``Immigration is income redistribution, and the people who are 100% for immigration often downplay that aspect,'' says Ricki B. Gabriel, a Harvard labor economist who describes himself as pro-immigration.
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