Tuesday, June 5, 2007

Immigrant, Migrant, or Refugee Bodies?: Point System Misses the Point




The proposed "point system" leaves Mexicans, the largest number of (im)migrants to the U.S., in limbo again. The system seeks to "award" points for better educated, higher skilled immigrants, and would remain in place for the next 14 years. But the point system isn't so much a compromise between Democrats and Republicans as it is a failed system from its conception. It does not address the most pressing issues affecting Mexican immigration to this country, the economies these immigrants help to keep afloat through their labor, nor the working conditions that make their bodies expendable commodities in this economy. Locking the point system into law for the next 14 years neither addresses the U.S.'s changing economy, nor its ability to compete in a "new world order" of its own creation.

"Ekaterina D. Atanasova, a civil engineer from Bulgaria who lives in southern Maine, wants to bring her husband to the United States. Under the Senate immigration bill, he would get high marks — at least 74 points — because he too is a civil engineer, has a master’s degree and is fluent in English.

But Herminia Licona Sandoval, a cleaning woman from Honduras, would have no hope of bringing her 30-year-old son to the United States. He works as a driver at an oil refinery, lacks a high school diploma, speaks little English and would fare poorly under the Senate bill, earning fewer than 15 of a possible 100 points." (Robert Pear, A Point System for Immigrants Incites Passions)